Posted on 03/08/2006 10:31:49 PM PST by Coleus
Wasn't her family just the LEAST bit curious about this guy? If they'd nipped it in the bud at her 8th grade graduation, they'd have saved her a lifetime's worth of heartbreak.
Usually I'm into a story like this.. but this one was strange all around --- it had this "heavy victim mentality" feel and things didn't add up. Passing out flyers, going to a club... He gave her a box of pens...
No mention of the parents...
Then she sulks and puts her life on hold. My advice, go get a college degree and hold your head high. Will she get a college degree, a Law degree, to do some good or will she be depressed for the next 70 years... afterall she will live upwards of 90 years...
I'm done with this story... weird.
But, yes, the law are good ones, they change the ethos of a society.
I tell you .... a stupid and weird story.
All the refrains of "where were her parents" are fine, but it suggests that somehow this girl got what she deserved because she had neglectful parents. If we believe there is such a thing as statutory rape, is it only applicable when the parents care?
I didn't say she got what she deserved! She didn't deserve ANY of this crap! What she did deserve, and obviously didn't HAVE were parents that gave a damn about what she did and who she hung around with!! This creep was at her 8th Grade Graduation for heaven's sake!! Didn't her parents have ANY clue?
Where were her parents? Where was her school? What were they teaching at Sacred Heart Academy that made her think that 4 abortions and a miscarriage (all without the benefit of marriage) was permissable? You'd think that she'd have wised up after the first one.
No father is mentioned in this story. Are her parents divorced? Her mother abandoned? I'm sure that her mother thought that the school was taking care of teaching her daughter morals, but that is just not good enough. When her grades fell because of her promiscuous and turbulent lifestyle, her mother put her at an academy for learning disabled children. Who suggested that for a former honor student?
As an armchair psychologist, it sounds like this child was craving the attention of a man (absent father?).
This is a very, very sad story, and the guy who did this ought to go to jail for a very long time.
You know he will not.
That is what is really pathetic.
This 30+ year old is very much guilty of raping this child and then mentally controlling her until she aged and seemingly obtained a clue as to what was going on. Joe Picolli at 30+ years old is vastly mentally supperior to this child and when she was a child, didn’t have a chance. He raped her, controlled her and impregnated her over several years - they should lock him up in general pop so he can see what rape is. I’m sorry, I place very little blame on this child as most people know, children are always open to new things and this loser took total advantage by enticing her and continually raping her phisically and mentally for several years. This country needs to start exterminating these losers.
Man acquitted of statutory rape
Thursday, October 1, 2009
LAST UPDATED: THURSDAY OCTOBER 1, 2009, 7:10 AM
BY KIBRET MARKOS
THE RECORD
STAFF WRITER
3 Comments
A Rutherford man was acquitted Wednesday of charges that he had sex with an underage girl, bringing an end to a troubled case that lingered for more than five years through several pitfalls.
Joseph Picolli broke into tears as a jury cleared him of charges that he had a sexual relationship with a Lyndhurst girl from 1998 to 2001, which began when she was 13.
“A great burden has been lifted off the Picolli family,” defense lawyer John Bruno declared. “Like I said before, there are no winners in this case, because so much has been lost, financially, emotionally and in terms of reputation.”
Picolli was arrested and charged in 2004, after the girl told investigators she met him when she was 13 – Picolli was 31 at the time – and had an affair with him for years. She also told investigators that Picolli got her pregnant several times.
FAST FACTS
The age of consent in New Jersey is 16. Anyone under that age is deemed too young under state law to consent to having sex with an adult.
Having intercourse with anyone between the ages of 13 and 16 is considered sexual assault (commonly known as statutory rape) if the adult is more than four years older than the minor. It carries up to 10 years in prison.
Mistaking the age of the victim — such as the often-invoked “I thought she was 18” — is not a legal defense.
Source: New Jersey Criminal Code
Picolli denied the charges and challenged the girl’s credibility, saying she had changed her story several times.
Picolli was indicted in 2005 on charges of sexual assault on an underage girl — more commonly known as statutory rape. The charges carry up to 10 years in prison and come with sex-offender registration requirements under Megan’s Law.
The indictment, however, was dismissed two years later, after it was revealed that Bergen County prosecutors failed to present evidence that could have helped Picolli.
Prosecutors presented the case to another grand jury and obtained a second indictment. When Picolli went to trial in January, however, a prosecutor’s error led to a mistrial on the first day.
The eight women and four men on his second trial jury deliberated for less than three hours before they returned Wednesday with a not-guilty verdict on two counts of sexual assault and one count of child endangerment.
“We are disappointed with the verdict,” Bergen County Prosecutor John L. Molinelli said. “We believe that he did the offense as charged. But the verdict is like all of them that come down in the justice system. We have to accept them.”
Picolli, now a married father of two, said he turned down several plea offers, including one that came with no jail time.
“I wasn’t taking any plea, because the name has to be cleared,” he said Wednesday. “I am glad it turned out this way.”
How about her mother her took her for her first abortion at 13?
Judge dismisses final charges against Rutherford man charged in sex assault
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
BY KIBRET MARKOS
THE RECORD
STAFF WRITER
0 Comments
A judge has dismissed the final charges in the long and troubled case against a Rutherford man who was charged with sexually assaulting two underage girls.
Bergen County prosecutors said the latest setback in the case against Joseph Picolli came when one of the alleged victims declined to cooperate with authorities.
“I feel like the weight of the world has been lifted off of my shoulders,” Picolli, a married father of two, said Wednesday in a written statement. “I look forward to moving on with my life without the dark cloud that has been hanging over my head for over five years.”
Picolli, 42, was charged in 2004 after a Lyndhurst girl told investigators that Picolli met her when she was 13 and he was 31, and had an affair with her for years, authorities said.
Another underage girl from Lyndhurst alleged that Picolli had sex with her in 1998 when she was 13.
Picolli, who denied both allegations, was indicted in 2005 on statutory-rape charges. The indictment was thrown out two years later after a judge found that prosecutors failed to present evidence that could have been favorable to Picolli.
The case was presented for the second time to another grand jury, which indicted Picolli on the same charges.
Picolli went on trial in Superior Court in Hackensack in January 2009, but a judge declared a mistrial on the first day after a prosecutor mistakenly introduced evidence that should not have been revealed to a jury.
Nine months later, another jury acquitted Picolli of charges that he had sex with one of the alleged victims.
Prosecutors said at the time that they would pursue the case of the second alleged victim. Last week, however, they filed a motion to dismiss the indictment, saying the alleged victim has decided not to cooperate.
“Right now, without a victim coming forward and cooperating with authorities, we cannot prove our case in court,” Bergen County Prosecutor John Molinelli said.
Superior Court Judge Edward A. Jerejian dismissed the indictment in a one-page order signed on Monday.
“My client and I are obviously relieved that this matter has finally been concluded,” Picolli’s attorney, John Bruno, said Wednesday.
“After dozens of court appearances, conferences, investigations, motions, indictments, new indictments, a mistrial, an acquittal and finally a court order dismissing the final charges, it all came down to ‘he said, she said’,” Bruno said.
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