Oliver Jovanovic Case Summary

. A case that involved the topic of rape and the laws pertinent to it was that of Oliver Jovanovic. In 1998, Jovanovic, then a student at Columbia University in New York City, was convicted of attacking a Barnard College student, Jamie Rzucek. Rzucek claimed that Jovanovic had subjected her to torture and sexual abuse, holding her in his apartment for 20 hours. The defense claimed that the bondage was consensual, and said they had electronic-mail transcripts between the two as evidence that Rzucek had consented to the activity. However, the judge refused to admit the transcripts as evidence, saying that because they detailed the accuser's sexual conduct, they violated New York's rape shield law. In 1999, an appeals court ordered a retrial,