Have just been sent this disturbing video by my pen-friend in NC - she writes that this is the principal reason she - a life-long Democrat will not be voting in the November elections
No doubt HRC would wish this long since buried. Will do her credibility absolutely no good
Have just been sent this disturbing video by my pen-friend in NC - she writes that this is the principal reason she - a life-long Democrat will not be voting in the November elections
No doubt HRC would wish this long since buried. Will do her credibility absolutely no good
Claim: Hillary Clinton successfully defended an accused child rapist and later laughed about the case.
MixtureWHAT'S TRUE: In 1975, young lawyer Hillary Clinton was requested as lawyer for the defense in a rape case involving a 12-year-old girl; Clinton reluctantly took on the case, successfully challenged mismanaged evidence, and entered a plea bargain for the defendant.
WHAT'S FALSE: Clinton laughed about the unreliable nature of polygraphs, not the case's outcome; Clinton did not volunteer to be the man's lawyer; Clinton did not claim the complainant fantasized about being raped by older men; the case did not go to trial.
Example: [Collected via e-mail and Internet, May 2016]
On FB:
Photo of a young girl crying.
Caption: In 1975 when I was 12, I was raped by a 42 year old man. Hillary Clinton volunteered to be his lawyer.
In court, Hillary told the judge that I made up the rape story because I enjoyed fantasizing about older men.
Hillary got my rapist freed. In 1980 she gave an interview where she admitted she kenw he was guilty. And she laughed about it.
Hillary Clinton is an advocate for rapists.
Not for women or children.
Origin:On 1 May 2016, the above-reproduced meme began circulating on Facebook; alongside the photo of a crying girl, it read:
In 1975 when I was 12, I was raped by a 42 year old man. Hillary Clinton volunteered to be his lawyer.
In court, Hillary told the judge that I made up the rape story because I enjoyed fantasizing about older men.
Hillary got my rapist freed. In 1980 she gave an interview where she admitted she knew he was guilty. And she laughed about it.
Hillary Clinton is an advocate for rapists.
Not for women or children.
THIS STORY IS TRUE. PHOTO NOT THE ACTUAL VICTIM
According to the meme, after a 12-year-old girl was raped in 1975, Hillary Clinton volunteered to be the defendant's lawyer — and then told the judge in the case that the young girl concocted the story due to a rape fantasy. The meme further claimed that Clinton discussed the case at length in 1980 and laughed about it, admitting that she believed her client had actually been guilty.
A video of Clinton purportedly discussing the case was often attached to the meme:
The audio of the tapes was difficult to hear, but her replies appeared on screen in yellow text. The only context provided was that the discussion was part of a series of interviews in the 1980s with a journalist named Roy Reed. In one portion, Clinton described the case as terrible, and that it had forever destroyed her confidence in polygraph testing. Immediately afterwards, Clinton was described as "laughing," but the laughter was in apparent response to what she believed was unreliable polygraphs:
"The Hillary Tapes" didn't surface during Clinton's 2008 presidential bid, but as an incidental find by a conservative outlet, The Washington Free Beacon, in June 2014. A fact check of the claims found that Clinton discussed the case in her 2003 book Living History, and that she inaccurately described some key details of the case:
In comparing the 1980s interview with the case details, we found that Clinton misremembered several points about the case. She wrongly recounted the length of the sentence in Taylor’s plea deal (she said two months in jail, but it was actually a year in jail and four years’ probation) and she couldn’t recall the name of the Nobel Prize-winning blood expert from New York, whose promise to testify was critical to her defense.
In that light, her statements that she took the case as a favor and that she couldn’t get out of it make more sense. Thrush, who spent weeks in Arkansas critically reviewing Clinton’s work on the case, told PolitiFact that the statements may actually go hand-in-hand.
"Every person that I spoke with indicated to me that it was a formal court arrangement, but also that it is a small county, and there were personal relationships between all the lawyers in the county," Thrush said. "And while she was required to do it, I don’t see any contradiction in her viewing it as a favor."
Clinton’s teaching assistant at the law clinic told Newsday in 2008 that Clinton worked hard on the case "because she wanted to show that she was willing to take court appointments, hoping that the bar would help us in getting established."
That analysis also took into account 2008 statements made by Washington County prosecutor Mahlon Gibson about Clinton's willingness to represent the client. Clinton described the case in the tapes as one she wasn't eager to be part of, and others recalled her reticence:
In 2008, Gibson told Newsday that "Hillary told me she didn’t want to take that case. She made that very clear."
Recently, Gibson made similar comments to CNN. He said the judge, Maupin Cummings (now deceased), found Clinton on a list of lawyers who would represent low-income clients.
According to Gibson, Clinton called him and said, "I don't want to represent this guy. I just can't stand this. I don't want to get involved. Can you get me off?"
"I told her, ‘Well, contact the judge and see what he says about it,’ but I also said, ‘Don't jump on him and make him mad,’ " Gibson said. "She contacted the judge, and the judge didn't remove her, and she stayed on the case."
When the tapes surfaced in 2014, a number of outlets pored over documents from the 1975 case. Among them was an affidavit (p. 34) sworn by Clinton, from which the "in court, Hillary told the judge" portion of the meme was derived:
In the document, Clinton requested the victim undergo psychiatric evaluation. She further described the complainant as "emotionally unstable with a tendency to seek out older men and engage in fantasizing," adding that the victim had "in the past made [similar] false accusations." Finally, Clinton said that "an expert in child psychology" told her that "children in early adolescence [tended] to exaggerate or romanticize sexual experience and that adolescents with disorganized families, such as the complainant, are even more prone to such behavior."
Portions of Clinton's sworn statement bore some resemblance to the meme. Clinton did state that the victim sought "out older men" and "engage[d] in fantasizing," but did not combine the two statements to say the girl fantasized about rape. Clinton also argued that children of that age tended to "exaggerate or romanticize sexual experience[s]," but, again, did not say that the girl fantasized about rape.
It's true that in 1975, Clinton defended a man accused of raping a 12-year-old girl. People who knew her at the time said that she was unenthusiastic at the prospect of defending him, but committed to do the job required of her as a defense attorney (who had been appointed to the case). In audio recordings several years later, Clinton laughed describing the case, but her laughter was related to her own statement that the defendant's passing a polygraph test forever destroyed her faith in polygraphs. In those same tapes, Clinton described the case as "terrible."
Clinton successfully arranged for a plea bargain due to mishandling of evidence, and her client was sentenced to a year in jail (time served) and four years of probation. That outcome is not unusual for violent criminal charges, even decades later: 2014 statistics show that fewer than three percent of criminal cases (including rape) go to trial, and the remaining 97 percent are resolved through plea bargaining. The ratio of plea bargains to trials undertaken was similar in 1970 [PDF].
Clinton did not "volunteer" her services as the meme stated. An affidavit from 1975 was cherry-picked to paint her defense strategy as more callous than it was, and the charge resulted in a plea bargain. Clinton did not "get [the defendant] freed" in a criminal trial, as he served a year in prison and four additional years of probation. Finally, the 1975 criminal case came before rape shield laws in the late 1970s and early 1980s, which now protects rape victims in court from some forms of questioning. A case brought in 1975 would have been subject to much weaker legal protection for the accuser.
Claim: Hillary Clinton successfully defended an accused child rapist and later laughed about the case.
MixtureWHAT'S TRUE: In 1975, young lawyer Hillary Clinton was requested as lawyer for the defense in a rape case involving a 12-year-old girl; Clinton reluctantly took on the case, successfully challenged mismanaged evidence, and entered a plea bargain for the defendant.
WHAT'S FALSE: Clinton laughed about the unreliable nature of polygraphs, not the case's outcome; Clinton did not volunteer to be the man's lawyer; Clinton did not claim the complainant fantasized about being raped by older men; the case did not go to trial.
Example: [Collected via e-mail and Internet, May 2016]
On FB:
Photo of a young girl crying.
Caption: In 1975 when I was 12, I was raped by a 42 year old man. Hillary Clinton volunteered to be his lawyer.
In court, Hillary told the judge that I made up the rape story because I enjoyed fantasizing about older men.
Hillary got my rapist freed. In 1980 she gave an interview where she admitted she kenw he was guilty. And she laughed about it.
Hillary Clinton is an advocate for rapists.
Not for women or children.
Origin:On 1 May 2016, the above-reproduced meme began circulating on Facebook; alongside the photo of a crying girl, it read:
In 1975 when I was 12, I was raped by a 42 year old man. Hillary Clinton volunteered to be his lawyer.
In court, Hillary told the judge that I made up the rape story because I enjoyed fantasizing about older men.
Hillary got my rapist freed. In 1980 she gave an interview where she admitted she knew he was guilty. And she laughed about it.
Hillary Clinton is an advocate for rapists.
Not for women or children.
THIS STORY IS TRUE. PHOTO NOT THE ACTUAL VICTIM
According to the meme, after a 12-year-old girl was raped in 1975, Hillary Clinton volunteered to be the defendant's lawyer — and then told the judge in the case that the young girl concocted the story due to a rape fantasy. The meme further claimed that Clinton discussed the case at length in 1980 and laughed about it, admitting that she believed her client had actually been guilty.
A video of Clinton purportedly discussing the case was often attached to the meme:
The audio of the tapes was difficult to hear, but her replies appeared on screen in yellow text. The only context provided was that the discussion was part of a series of interviews in the 1980s with a journalist named Roy Reed. In one portion, Clinton described the case as terrible, and that it had forever destroyed her confidence in polygraph testing. Immediately afterwards, Clinton was described as "laughing," but the laughter was in apparent response to what she believed was unreliable polygraphs:
"The Hillary Tapes" didn't surface during Clinton's 2008 presidential bid, but as an incidental find by a conservative outlet, The Washington Free Beacon, in June 2014. A fact check of the claims found that Clinton discussed the case in her 2003 book Living History, and that she inaccurately described some key details of the case:
In comparing the 1980s interview with the case details, we found that Clinton misremembered several points about the case. She wrongly recounted the length of the sentence in Taylor’s plea deal (she said two months in jail, but it was actually a year in jail and four years’ probation) and she couldn’t recall the name of the Nobel Prize-winning blood expert from New York, whose promise to testify was critical to her defense.
In that light, her statements that she took the case as a favor and that she couldn’t get out of it make more sense. Thrush, who spent weeks in Arkansas critically reviewing Clinton’s work on the case, told PolitiFact that the statements may actually go hand-in-hand.
"Every person that I spoke with indicated to me that it was a formal court arrangement, but also that it is a small county, and there were personal relationships between all the lawyers in the county," Thrush said. "And while she was required to do it, I don’t see any contradiction in her viewing it as a favor."
Clinton’s teaching assistant at the law clinic told Newsday in 2008 that Clinton worked hard on the case "because she wanted to show that she was willing to take court appointments, hoping that the bar would help us in getting established."
That analysis also took into account 2008 statements made by Washington County prosecutor Mahlon Gibson about Clinton's willingness to represent the client. Clinton described the case in the tapes as one she wasn't eager to be part of, and others recalled her reticence:
In 2008, Gibson told Newsday that "Hillary told me she didn’t want to take that case. She made that very clear."
Recently, Gibson made similar comments to CNN. He said the judge, Maupin Cummings (now deceased), found Clinton on a list of lawyers who would represent low-income clients.
According to Gibson, Clinton called him and said, "I don't want to represent this guy. I just can't stand this. I don't want to get involved. Can you get me off?"
"I told her, ‘Well, contact the judge and see what he says about it,’ but I also said, ‘Don't jump on him and make him mad,’ " Gibson said. "She contacted the judge, and the judge didn't remove her, and she stayed on the case."
When the tapes surfaced in 2014, a number of outlets pored over documents from the 1975 case. Among them was an affidavit (p. 34) sworn by Clinton, from which the "in court, Hillary told the judge" portion of the meme was derived:
In the document, Clinton requested the victim undergo psychiatric evaluation. She further described the complainant as "emotionally unstable with a tendency to seek out older men and engage in fantasizing," adding that the victim had "in the past made [similar] false accusations." Finally, Clinton said that "an expert in child psychology" told her that "children in early adolescence [tended] to exaggerate or romanticize sexual experience and that adolescents with disorganized families, such as the complainant, are even more prone to such behavior."
Portions of Clinton's sworn statement bore some resemblance to the meme. Clinton did state that the victim sought "out older men" and "engage[d] in fantasizing," but did not combine the two statements to say the girl fantasized about rape. Clinton also argued that children of that age tended to "exaggerate or romanticize sexual experience[s]," but, again, did not say that the girl fantasized about rape.
It's true that in 1975, Clinton defended a man accused of raping a 12-year-old girl. People who knew her at the time said that she was unenthusiastic at the prospect of defending him, but committed to do the job required of her as a defense attorney (who had been appointed to the case). In audio recordings several years later, Clinton laughed describing the case, but her laughter was related to her own statement that the defendant's passing a polygraph test forever destroyed her faith in polygraphs. In those same tapes, Clinton described the case as "terrible."
Clinton successfully arranged for a plea bargain due to mishandling of evidence, and her client was sentenced to a year in jail (time served) and four years of probation. That outcome is not unusual for violent criminal charges, even decades later: 2014 statistics show that fewer than three percent of criminal cases (including rape) go to trial, and the remaining 97 percent are resolved through plea bargaining. The ratio of plea bargains to trials undertaken was similar in 1970 [PDF].
Clinton did not "volunteer" her services as the meme stated. An affidavit from 1975 was cherry-picked to paint her defense strategy as more callous than it was, and the charge resulted in a plea bargain. Clinton did not "get [the defendant] freed" in a criminal trial, as he served a year in prison and four additional years of probation. Finally, the 1975 criminal case came before rape shield laws in the late 1970s and early 1980s, which now protects rape victims in court from some forms of questioning. A case brought in 1975 would have been subject to much weaker legal protection for the accuser.
well, maybe that's what the USA needs.
hillary would be a good president. she ticks all the right boxes.
shrewd, deceitful, untrustworthy, dishonest, duplicitous, cunning.
just what's needed in these crazy times.
well, maybe that's what the USA needs.
hillary would be a good president. she ticks all the right boxes.
shrewd, deceitful, untrustworthy, dishonest, duplicitous, cunning.
just what's needed in these crazy times.
well, maybe that's what the USA needs.
hillary would be a good president. she ticks all the right boxes.
shrewd, deceitful, untrustworthy, dishonest, duplicitous, cunning.
just what's needed in these crazy times.
Love it Roger..............keep up the good work!
Sheila,
If you read something damning about *any*one, check the source. And fact check. And double check.
But, if it's Fox News saying something about *any* Democrat, rest assured that it's not true, not even barely true.
snopes.com is your friend.
Sheila,
If you read something damning about *any*one, check the source. And fact check. And double check.
But, if it's Fox News saying something about *any* Democrat, rest assured that it's not true, not even barely true.
snopes.com is your friend.
