Tuesday, May 17, 2005
This is quite frightening...
Two months ago we heard that a young girl was raped in her own home in Essex by an intruder. She was quoted as giving a very detailed description of her attacker: "a black man, aged 18 to 20, with dirty teeth, one of them being distinctively clean. He is skinny and wore a grey top and loose ripped trousers, with a loop of chain down one side." Later an artist's impression of the attacker was released again based on her description. Now we are told that the rape claim was false. Now I have no way of knowing the details of the case and what is going on but I do know that only 6% of reported rapes lead to convictions in the UK and that police and prosecutors failing to "believe" victims is a key problem. I'd like to see the case reviewed.
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Erm I think you've both sort of missed my point. My point is that only 6% of reported rapes ever lead to convictions and that this case has been dismissed very quickly and smells like another case of the police not taking allegations seriously.
Lee's point about racism is a very valid one (although unrelated to the pointI was making). My local police station has a sign up warning that reporting the loss of heavily insured items with the story that "two black guys mugged me" will not be accepted lightly, due to the levels of insurance fraud.
But both of you seem to be implying that there is some sort of large-scale problem with false reports of rape. I don't believe that there is. Sure there may be one or two - inevitably the media makes a big song and dance about them because the media loves to portray women as evil and scheming, thus leading to even less support for those who have actually been raped.
The possibility that this girl, like the one lee mentioned, has in fact been raped by someone inside the home and then pushed into giving a false description, is certainly one which had crossed my mind. My point was that when we KNOW that only 6% of rape victims are given the support they need to push for a conviction, should we be glibly dismissing cases without a fuller enquiry?
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