And I believe that's all that needs to be said for the way the issue was handled. Reminds me of the Salem Witchcraft trials. "A witch! A witch!! May we burn her?"
Nothing says, "teach your children about the world" like instilling wonderful qualities such as jumping the gun, and most of all- going nuts and stirring everyone up into a frenzy before you even know what the hell is going on.
"Child molester" with unknown record of offense: 0
Angry mob looking for blood "to protect the kids": 1
And like others, I'd be the first one to lead the ass-kicking of a child molester- but that doesn't mean that I agree with this very poorly executed system of labeling people as sex offenders because their crime fits neatly in a pre-printed list.
The role of the police is to enforce the laws- it is in the judge, however, that we are supposed to expect correct and fair
interpretation of the laws. No such thing is done in these cases. As has been pointed out, an 18 year old has sex with his 17 year old girlfriend on the night of his birthday, and he's technically now able to prosecute as a sex offender for "raping" a minor. The day before, it was two minors having a romp before the parents came home, and now it's rape? No no.
It's a massively flawed system to label people who don't pose a danger to others, and irreversibly stigmatizes them as though they did, or do.
We all want to make the world safe and protect the innocent- but this is a gross overstepping of reality and necessity.