Here are the facts, which are not in dispute: in 2013 a woman employed as a typist at Pennsylvania’s Rockview State Prison was brutally raped by Omar Best, a man with a long and vicious history of previous violent assault and rape convictions. After Best’s conviction – he’s serving a life sentence for this, because apparently we just can’t hang serial rapists anymore and then go home to our dinners – the victim proceeded to sue everyone involved, both individually and collectively. There’s considerable evidence that PA’s Department of Corrections, both individually and collectively, put the victim at extreme risks, over her explicit objections; so you’d think that the state would settle, right?

Well… turns out that the Attorney General’s office is an elected position, and the Democrat who runs it – Kathleen Kane – runs an interesting kind of shop out there. Oh, and before we go any further: I’m telling you that Kane is a Democrat because, apparently, nobody else will.  Anyway, on Tuesday it came out that the AG’s office decided to base its defense of the DoC on the novel strategy of blaming the victim for getting raped:

In the documents, Kane defends the state Department of Corrections, the former Rockview superintendent and two employees, arguing, among other things, that there was contributory negligence on the part of the victim.

“Some or all of the damages plaintiff have alleged are in part, or substantially due, to the acts of third parties other than the answering defendants, and/or plaintiff acted in a manner which in whole or in part contributed to the events which led to the damages plaintiff has alleged in her complaint,” Kane wrote.

This naturally led to a rather large amount of horrified outrage by people who don’t approve of blaming the victim of rape for a rape: “Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane’s office was inundated with phone calls Wednesday about a Sept. 5 filing in response to a lawsuit brought by a former Rockview state prison employee who was brutally raped by an inmate last year.”

And Kane’s ultimate response? Hey, my staff signs my name to stuff all the time. Don’t expect me to read it all, OK? Still, the victim was totally at least partially responsible.  And I’m not twisting what they said, actually:

Wednesday, the office released a statement saying that it is required to present all possible defenses and “contributory negligence is one such defense.”

In the statement provided to CNN, the attorney general’s office said, “This initial filing should not necessarily be interpreted as meaning this defense will be pursued throughout the entire case,” adding that elected Attorney General Kathleen Kane was not aware her senior deputy included that defense in his filing.

“Attorney General Kane is disappointed that she was not made aware of this matter prior to the filing, and was saddened to learn that the filing implied that the victim somehow contributed to this crime.”

Bolding mine. AG Kathleen Kane is, of course, a hyper-partisan Democrat who we last saw squashing an investigation into fellow-Democrats who had been literally caught in the act of taking bribes.  It still astounds me that she has done this.  Even if you believe that nonsensical excuse… what, exactly, is Kane doing in the Attorney General’s office that is keeping her from keeping her staff under control; or, indeed, keeping their behavior consistent with the expectations of a civilized people?  – Besides helping Democrats, I guess.  And covering up the discovery of pornographic emails found on the Attorney General’s office’s own computer networks, of course.

Of course.

H/T: @PhilWillSays.

Image via Shutterstock.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

PS: Look… this woman is bad enough for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania as it is.  Imagine how it’s going to be if she has a Democrat in the Governor’s office next year.  There is, honestly, no alternative to Tom Corbett at this point.

PPS: So we know that a Pennsylvania Democrat has no problem with blaming an inconvenient rape victim for being raped. What does, say, Senators Mark Udall or Kay Hagan think about this issue? …Assuming that silence does not mean assent, of course.