Woman cries rape, convicted of Manslaughter

CaptainChewbacca · Post by **CaptainChewbacca** » 2008-05-06 01:13pm

Woman Who Falsely Cried Rape Convicted of Manslaughter

Saturday, May 03, 2008

FORT WORTH, Texas — An Arlington woman who caused her lover's shooting death by falsely crying rape was found guilty Friday of involuntary manslaughter.

Tracy Denise Roberson, 37, cried slightly when the verdict was announced after jurors had deliberated for more than a day. The punishment phase was set for Monday, and she faces two to 20 years in prison.

In late 2006, Darrell Roberson came home from a late-night card game to find his scantily clad wife with another man in a pickup truck in the driveway. Tracy Roberson was with her lover but cried rape, and her husband fired four shots into the truck as Devin LaSalle was driving off, killing him.

Darrell Roberson initially was arrested, but the murder charge later was dropped and a grand jury indicted Tracy Roberson instead.

During her three-day trial, defense attorneys called no witnesses but blamed LaSalle's death on Darrell Roberson's jealousy and rage.

But prosecutors placed all the blame on Tracy Roberson, showing evidence of the affair with LaSalle, 32, and a text message in which she invited him to her house that evening.

Good, she deserves every day of that twenty years. The husband isn't a saint by any means, but his wife's lies turned him into an instrument of rage that ended a life.

Superman · Post by **Superman** » 2008-05-06 01:16pm

Was this posted already?

CaptainChewbacca · Post by **CaptainChewbacca** » 2008-05-06 01:21pm

I don't think so. A search for 'manslaughter' in N&P didn't turn anything up.

Kanastrous · Post by **Kanastrous** » 2008-05-06 01:21pm

So in Texas you can shoot another man in the back while he is retreating - in a vehicle - and kill him, but your wife goes down for murder.

Wow.

Funny thing is, I know myself well enough to know that if it had turned out that LaSalle really *was* a rapist, I'd chuckle at the shooting, and move on.

Tanasinn · Post by **Tanasinn** » 2008-05-06 01:32pm

So in Texas you can shoot another man in the back while he is retreating - in a vehicle - and kill him, but your wife goes down for murder.

Wow.

...Keeping in mind, of course, that the woman was also in the truck and had just screamed "rape."

Superman · Post by **Superman** » 2008-05-06 01:36pm

Texas is a silly place. It's the only state I know of where using deadly force to protect your property is perfectly legal. You could actually shoot someone in the head because he picked you wallet and started to run away with it.

CaptainChewbacca · Post by **CaptainChewbacca** » 2008-05-06 01:42pm

Tanasinn wrote:
So in Texas you can shoot another man in the back while he is retreating - in a vehicle - and kill him, but your wife goes down for murder.

Wow.
...Keeping in mind, of course, that the woman was also in the truck and had just screamed "rape."

Ooh... interesting. The way I read the story she was out of the truck when he left, but if she was WITH him, then her husband was perceiving it as a kidnapping.

Havok · Post by **Havok** » 2008-05-06 01:57pm

So... wouldn't this guy have just shot them BOTH if she didn't cry rape?

The Duchess of Zeon · Post by **The Duchess of Zeon** » 2008-05-06 01:58pm

CaptainChewbacca wrote:
Tanasinn wrote:
So in Texas you can shoot another man in the back while he is retreating - in a vehicle - and kill him, but your wife goes down for murder.

Wow.
...Keeping in mind, of course, that the woman was also in the truck and had just screamed "rape."
Ooh... interesting. The way I read the story she was out of the truck when he left, but if she was WITH him, then her husband was perceiving it as a kidnapping.

Yes, in the case that someone is screaming for help while being driven away in a vehicle, it's quite legal and legitimate to open fire. Which means the conscious deception which created a situation in which force could be legally used was, in fact, murder on her part.

Kanastrous · Post by **Kanastrous** » 2008-05-06 02:06pm

Tanasinn wrote:
So in Texas you can shoot another man in the back while he is retreating - in a vehicle - and kill him, but your wife goes down for murder.

Wow.
...Keeping in mind, of course, that the woman was also in the truck and had just screamed "rape."

whoops, chalk that up to my crummy reading-comprehension...

Sidewinder · Post by **Sidewinder** » 2008-05-06 02:50pm

That woman's "crying wolf" has put her in a situation where if she was ACTUALLY raped in the future, the police (or prison guards) may assume she's lying again, and ignore her when she faces further abuse.

Kanastrous · Post by **Kanastrous** » 2008-05-06 02:54pm

Sidewinder wrote:That woman's "crying wolf" has put her in a situation where if she was ACTUALLY raped in the future, the police (or prison guards) may assume she's lying again, and ignore her when she faces further abuse.

Sounds like hot fresh tasty justice, to me.

Aeolus · Post by **Aeolus** » 2008-05-06 03:26pm

havokeff wrote:So... wouldn't this guy have just shot them BOTH if she didn't cry rape?

She probably thought so. What a bitch her first thought was to turn on her lover to save her own skin at his expense.

Vendetta · Post by **Vendetta** » 2008-05-06 03:54pm

Aeolus wrote:
havokeff wrote:So... wouldn't this guy have just shot them BOTH if she didn't cry rape?
She probably thought so. What a bitch her first thought was to turn on her lover to save her own skin at his expense.

Either that or she banked on lover boy high tailing it out of there, not pressing charges, and deflecting submission, and just forgot what state she lived in.

Vendetta · Post by **Vendetta** » 2008-05-06 03:55pm

And that should read "suspicion" not "submission", but my fingers are shit.

18-Till-I-Die · Post by **18-Till-I-Die** » 2008-05-06 04:25pm

I figure she was only really thinking that it was easier to accuse the guy of rape than to explain what she had really done and, possibly, go through a divorce. Basically i think she figured neither of them was worth her "time" or "effort" so she just tried to bullshit her way through it.

With spectacularly bad results, as we can see.

Elfdart · Post by **Elfdart** » 2008-05-06 06:07pm

What's kind of funny about these Redneck Honor Killings is that the "Sumbitch Deserved It" defense was officially outlawed here in Texas back in 1974, though juries and grand juries couldn't care less and no-bill cuckolded men all the time. Back in the early 1970s, the state ratified an Equal Rights Amendment meaning that all state laws shall be gender neutral. Then, as the late Molly Ivins described, the 99% male Legislature realized that women now had the legal right to bust a cap in cheating husbands and their mistresses. So the Redneck Honor Killing was abolished.

Aeolus · Post by **Aeolus** » 2008-05-06 11:36pm

Elfdart wrote:What's kind of funny about these Redneck Honor Killings is that the "Sumbitch Deserved It" defense was officially outlawed here in Texas back in 1974, though juries and grand juries couldn't care less and no-bill cuckolded men all the time. Back in the early 1970s, the state ratified an Equal Rights Amendment meaning that all state laws shall be gender neutral. Then, as the late Molly Ivins described, the 99% male Legislature realized that women now had the legal right to bust a cap in cheating husbands and their mistresses. So the Redneck Honor Killing was abolished.

sigh I miss Molly

Post by **Edi** » 2008-05-07 05:32am

All right, people. We still have fucking standards of evidence in N&P, so you all can cram the speculation about the woman's state of mind and motives right back up your arses unless you can actually produce justifications and evidence for them.

All we know from the article is that the woman cried rape, falsely identifying her lover as a rapist, and her husband shot what he thought was a genuine rapist dead. When that fact came out, she was charged with involuntary manslaughter and convicted, which is actually about the only possible outcome because her criminal negligence led to the man's death.

All the rest of it, whether she thought her husband would kill both of them etc etc, is pure speculation and should be treated as such here.