query for assistance with legal storyline

[Bob_McDonnell]

Hello to all,

I saw your shingle on the web and stopped by to ask a question in regard to an embyonic work of fiction.

I'm sure this is an incorrect interpretation of "story", but as the other forums appear to be intended for discussion of really serious issues, I chose this one for my monumentally inconsequential needs.

There is a story involved, but it's a piece of fiction, possibly a play, that I'm attempting to create, not an anecdote about an attorney. If anyone would care to share an opinion, expertise or experience in regard to these situations they would be both welcomed and appreciated.

The setting is contemporary urban New Jersey.

A cop on disability resulting from an on-the-job injury has intimate relations with a woman, who is coincidentally a mother in desperate need of cash.

The romance is real, as is the cost of rasing her daughter. Alimony and her job no longer stretch far enough to cover basic necessities. The cop, a widower with grown children has more money than he needs and so decides to help her "make ends meet". In his eagerness to rescue the damsel, he fails to make the connection that this constitutes remuneration for sex.

Now, if a third party, a really nasty type, armed with details of this "deal",
had an axe to grind against the cop, what kinds of legal trouble might that person cause?

And, if this same someone also had an axe to grind against the woman, might he not share this information in support of her ex-husband's filing of "unfit mother" charges.

Thanks,

Bob McDonnell,
Schaumburg, IL

 

[dee_dub]

what kinds of legal trouble might that person cause?

The answer to this question depends on the assumption that this

a widower with grown children has more money than he needs and so decides to help her "make ends meet"

equals this

this constitutes remuneration for sex.

I am not so sure that is correct. And thus I suspect that the malevolent force would not be able to cause any trouble, legally, for the cop or for the woman. I am not a criminal lawyer, but I suspect that receiving gifts from someone you are romantically involved with is not prostitution, so the woman is not afoul of any of those laws. Giving gifts to someone you have a real romance with is not purchasing sex, so the cop is not afoul of john laws. The bad guy might make things personally difficult for them; but legally, I don't see the problem.

 

[Bob_McDonnell]

Thanks Dee_Dub for your input.

It's difficult to share barely formed details of a story idea.

Would it make a difference if I had added, that the disabled cop and the desperate mother continued to meet on a regular basis in a clandestine manner with his contributions adding up to many thousands of dollars?

The woman on their first meeting had gone to the lounge at a Holiday Inn toying with the idea of prostitution, but not sure if she could go through with it? She came close to soliciting a proposition from the cop because he looked safe. Having worked vice he read her intentions, and made the decision to try to keep her from getting into a something she might not be able to handle. He had no intention initially of becoming her lover, much less her client. His wife had died of cancer a year earlier. No longer on the force, he had stopped in to say hello to the bartender, a friend he hadn't seen since the funeral.

The bar, a home away from home for businessmen might have seemed ideal for an amateur hooker, but it had also been a hangout for dangerous pimps and drug dealers. His experience alerted him early on to dangers into which she might fall prey, and as the romance blooms he sees his "contributions" as being necessary to her continued safety.

He saw her unnerved by a really bad character that first night. Someone she knew. A friend of her ex-husband who had been rejected by her while she was married, and as far back as high school. Like the cop, this fellow "read" her intention, but with vastly different notions. When he launches his plan to realize his dreams of conquest, the cop, seeing her reaction, blocks his way. The rest of the story descends from this.

Just ideas; seeds looking for a place to sprout, or maybe just fertilizer!

Anyway, thanks for your input. I gave it the working title, 'Priorities'.

what do you think?

Bob McDonnell

 

[dee_dub]

Would it make a difference if I had added, that the disabled cop and the desperate mother continued to meet on a regular basis in a clandestine manner with his contributions adding up to many thousands of dollars?

I doubt it. Give it the "tummy test" - if this was a real situation, and you were sleeping with this woman and giving her money, how afraid would you be that the two of you were engaging in prostitution? I am not a New Jersey criminal lawyer, but I would hazard a guess that being her sugar daddy is not going to get either of them in legal trouble.

You could always look for case law supporting the notion that they are engaged in prostitution. And if you can't find any, the fact that the criminal threat may be hollow may not affect the story so much. Invent a case supporting it, have some DA character spout it off, and presto. Lots of readable legal fiction exhibits a tenuous connection to legal reality.