Issues in the Iowa Supreme Court: Jetseta Gage May Have Her Day in Court

The Iowa Supreme Court will soon consider something which has generally been out-of-the-question: allowing a videotaped interview of a victim who is now deceased to be produced as evidence at trial. It remains to be seen, of course, whether the accused and his attorneys will succeed at getting this evidence suppressed based on an accused individual's "right" to confront his accuser.

If one is not familiar with the entirety of this particular case, the cast of individuals involved has been a tangled-up mess-- how far those who perpetrate horrendous acts will go in order to silence their victims.

Two years ago, a ten-year-old Cedar Rapids girl named Jetseta Gage was sexually assaulted, bound and murdered. A convicted sex offender named Roger Bentley was found guilty of the crime, and is currently serving his sentence. What is even more appalling was his motive-- Roger Bentley killed the little girl in order to silence her-- to prevent her from being able to have her "day in court" to testify against his brother, James Bentley, who had been accused of repeatedly molesting the girl.

The case has extended to its current extreme because James Bentley has asserted that since Jetseta Gage is dead, it would be a violation of his rights for the videotaped interview of Gage to be presented in court as evidence against him-- that since she is dead, to do so would violate his right to confront his accuser. The tape, where Gage describes the abuse to a child protective services worker, is the primary and most damaging piece of evidence against James Bentley, and, depending on the ruling by the Supreme Court, may or may not be accepted as evidence.

It would seem to be only common sense that the rights of a victim should take precedence over the rights of the accused; unfortunately, that is not the case. And that fact is shown in its absurdity-- will this legal technicality grant the Bentley brothers what they were both after: that the court will uphold permanently silencing Jetseta, that her words against James Bentley cannot be heard? Or will the court recognize that every victim should have the right to speak out against one who has committed such acts against her?

It remains to be seen which stand the Iowa Supreme Court will take in this case. If even to just consider the fact that Jetseta Gage's murder was for the purpose of preventing her from speaking in court, hopefully the Iowa Supreme Court will not allow Roger Bentley and James Bentley to have what they both aimed for in the first place-- further victimizing the little girl by rendering her voice permanently silenced. Consider, perhaps, that it is not about legalities, not even about the State of Iowa holding James Bentley accountable for his actions; but rather the right of one who has been victimized to "Break the Silence"-- to have her voice.