Without Consent: A Landmark Trial and the Decades Long Struggle to Make Marital Rape a Crime

Journalist Weinman (Scoundrel) provides a riveting account of the 1978 marital rape trial of John Rideout in Oregon. At the time, Weinman explains, only three states had laws against marital rape, and Oregon’s had never been tested. In most states, a wife could still not legally refuse to consent to sex with her husband, as Rideout’s wife, 23-year-old Greta, tried to do when he raped her in front of their two-year-old daughter. “I thought if I hit her, she would come out of it,” Rideout told investigators, adding that if he had “done it right,” she wouldn’t be complaining. A pretrial motion permitted the defense to bring up Greta’s sexual history, including an abortion, effectively putting her on trial instead. Rideout was acquitted, but public outrage launched marital rape to the forefront of feminist activism. Weinman charts the ensuing struggle and the tectonic cultural and legal transformations it brought about. Rideout was tried again 38 years later—and ultimately convicted—for raping two more partners (although a horror movie-esque coda reports that a recent Supreme Court decision has reversed one of the verdicts). Weinman’s skills as a storyteller shine throughout, including in her vibrant portraits of silver-haired, booming-voiced prosecutor Gary Gortmaker and his longtime nemesis, defense attorney Charles Burt. It’s a propulsive legal drama that underscores how difficult it still is to bring rapists to justice. (Nov.)