An earlier report of the incident hadn’t made clear there were multiple attackers. Had there been only the customer, depending very much on the niceties of the laws defining rape, prostitution, theft of services and precedents in PA concerning sexual consent, it was just barely conceivable that the judge might have been right as a point of law.
As it is, I agree with calls for her disbarrment: the legal reasoning applied here would make all rapes of prostitutes into theft of services cases, since the other attackers in this incident plainly did not have any agreement explicit or implied from the victim to have sex. Were the precedent allowed to stand, any rapist who attacked a prostitute could advance the defense against the rape charge that he was just stealing her services.
Did you read this part?
“She went to a North Philadelphia home to meet the customer, who had agreed to pay her $150 for sex. He then said a friend was coming with the money, and that the friend would pay her another $100 for sex.”
She agree to sex with at least two men. That’s her own testimony.
I am curious how this case could be affected if prostitution were legal. The act would then be reduced (elevated?) to simply a service being provided. As I see it, it would be much easier to argue the "theft of services" defense if the prostitute is, at least in a legal sense, simply providing a service.