No means dough
No means dough
Woman has to pay $1,000 a month in alimony to ex-husband who raped her
She calls it “the rape discount.”
A woman who has to pay her ex-husband alimony even after he was convicted of raping her has launched a crusade to change the legal system.
Crystal Harris, a mother of two who lives in Southern California, said the court reduced her alimony tab to $1,000 a month instead of $3,000, because of the rape, according to KCBS in Los Angeles.
The judge’s order added insult to injury, she said.
“It just felt like I was being victimized again ... if it’s a ‘stranger rape’ and the victim has to pay her rapist, that’s disgusting. It’s immoral,” Harris, 39, told the CBS station.
She doesn’t think she should have to pay her ex-husband anything.
Now Harris is working with San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis to try to get lawmakers to make it illegal for a judge to order an abused spouse to pay alimony to their abuser.
“I wanted to change the law immediately so we can make sure [it] doesn’t happen again in the future,” Dumanis told 10News, a local television station.
Crystal Harris, who earns six figures a year, will be forced to pay the alimony after her ex-husband, Shawn Harris, 40, who was unemployed while they were married, gets out of prison. He has served two years of his six-year sentence for the rape.
During his trial, Shawn Harris denied that he raped his wife, claiming that the couple was just role-playing.
Crystal Harris says her husband not only raped her but threatened to kill her. She fears that he will come after her once he’s out of prison - just when she will have to start shelling out thousands of dollars a year to support him.
“I do still worry about what’s going to happen when he gets out, but at least I’ve got a few years where I can raise my boys and have some peace,” she said.
Proof can be hard to come by in domestic violence situations, but Crystal Harris was able to record the 2008 rape on a tape recorder that was hidden in her underwear drawer.
“Nobody deserves to be raped, Shawn! Please, please!” a woman is heard screaming on the tape, which Crystal Harris turned over to police. “You’re hurting my neck! Ow, my neck! I can’t breathe!”
The man on the tape tells the woman, “Shut up.”
Crystal Harris, a resident of Carlsbad, Calif., claims her husband of 12 years choked her to the point that she started to black out during the recorded incident.
“It was long enough to where I remember thinking, ‘God, I didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye to my boys upstairs,’” she said.
The judge who set the alimony during the couple’s divorce defended his order.
“I can’t look at a 12-year marriage where one side is making $400 a month, the other side is making over $110,000 and say no spousal support,” Judge Gregory Pollock said in court, according to a report by 10News.com. “That would be an abuse of discretion.”
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That judge can seriously go choke on a cactus. "Abuse of discretion" my ass.
Woman has to pay $1,000 a month in alimony to ex-husband who raped her
She calls it “the rape discount.”
A woman who has to pay her ex-husband alimony even after he was convicted of raping her has launched a crusade to change the legal system.
Crystal Harris, a mother of two who lives in Southern California, said the court reduced her alimony tab to $1,000 a month instead of $3,000, because of the rape, according to KCBS in Los Angeles.
The judge’s order added insult to injury, she said.
“It just felt like I was being victimized again ... if it’s a ‘stranger rape’ and the victim has to pay her rapist, that’s disgusting. It’s immoral,” Harris, 39, told the CBS station.
She doesn’t think she should have to pay her ex-husband anything.
Now Harris is working with San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis to try to get lawmakers to make it illegal for a judge to order an abused spouse to pay alimony to their abuser.
“I wanted to change the law immediately so we can make sure [it] doesn’t happen again in the future,” Dumanis told 10News, a local television station.
Crystal Harris, who earns six figures a year, will be forced to pay the alimony after her ex-husband, Shawn Harris, 40, who was unemployed while they were married, gets out of prison. He has served two years of his six-year sentence for the rape.
During his trial, Shawn Harris denied that he raped his wife, claiming that the couple was just role-playing.
Crystal Harris says her husband not only raped her but threatened to kill her. She fears that he will come after her once he’s out of prison - just when she will have to start shelling out thousands of dollars a year to support him.
“I do still worry about what’s going to happen when he gets out, but at least I’ve got a few years where I can raise my boys and have some peace,” she said.
Proof can be hard to come by in domestic violence situations, but Crystal Harris was able to record the 2008 rape on a tape recorder that was hidden in her underwear drawer.
“Nobody deserves to be raped, Shawn! Please, please!” a woman is heard screaming on the tape, which Crystal Harris turned over to police. “You’re hurting my neck! Ow, my neck! I can’t breathe!”
The man on the tape tells the woman, “Shut up.”
Crystal Harris, a resident of Carlsbad, Calif., claims her husband of 12 years choked her to the point that she started to black out during the recorded incident.
“It was long enough to where I remember thinking, ‘God, I didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye to my boys upstairs,’” she said.
The judge who set the alimony during the couple’s divorce defended his order.
“I can’t look at a 12-year marriage where one side is making $400 a month, the other side is making over $110,000 and say no spousal support,” Judge Gregory Pollock said in court, according to a report by 10News.com. “That would be an abuse of discretion.”
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That judge can seriously go choke on a cactus. "Abuse of discretion" my ass.