From Kidd v. State, decided today by the Arkansas Court of Appeals, in an opinion by Chief Judge Brandon Harrison, joined by Judges Rita Gruber and Kenneth Hixson:
Kidd and M.C. met at a private high school with ten to fifteen students. She [Kidd] was a senior. He [M.C.] was in ninth grade. Kidd was about three years, nine months older. They exchanged DMs (direct messages) on Snapchat, Instagram, and Pinterest. The conversations went where one might guess.
During Spring Break in March 2021, the two had sexual intercourse at least seven times, mostly in Kidd's parked car. She was then eighteen; he was fourteen. M.C.'s parents found out. The prosecution that followed revealed that virtually everyone involved had made some mistaken assumptions about what sexual conduct between Kidd and M.C. was or was not prohibited by Arkansas law.
Kidd had assumed that, because of her and M.C.'s ages, sexual intercourse with M.C. was a crime. She told him in one message that if she became pregnant with his baby, she would have to give birth in jail. M.C.'s parents also believed sexual intercourse between Kidd and M.C. was illegal, and testified so at the bench trial.
In truth, it was not a crime for Kidd to "engage in sexual intercourse" with M.C.—at least it was not a sexual assault, the crime she probably had in mind (and which the State might rather have charged). It would have been second-degree sexual assault for Kidd, who was "eighteen years of age or older" to engage in "sexual contact with another person who is [l]ess than fourteen (14) years of age." But M.C. was fourteen. It would have been fourth-degree sexual assault if, at "twenty (20) years of age or older" she had "[e]ngage[d] in sexual intercourse or deviate sexual activity" or "sexual contact" with a person under sixteen. But Kidd was younger than twenty.
