To think some changes to the law on suspect's accused with sexual offences are needed.

[11122aa]

I am a sexual assault survivor.
After the cliff Richard verdict am I wrong to think that people should not be named when investigated for sexual offences. Or even when charged. Or even naming the accuser as does happen in some countries abroad if there is a not guilty verdict?

Just from an investigation point of view, keeping an accused anonymous is very bad practice. It's important to get information out about a crime (in a controlled way) so that potential witnesses can come forward. If a person accused of a crime can't be named then no one who saw that person on the night of the crime, for example, can come forward to give evidence. If all accused people remained anonymous very few crimes would be solved.

Toads has said everything I wanted to!

So yabvu.

Should the accusation be false then that person has to live with their name all over the media to be googled with that attached

False accusations of sexual offences are rare and are no higher than false accusations of other crimes.

Also people seem to decide they think they are guilty which can lead to violence

Or they just assume that if someone has been acquitted that automatically means that the accusation was false and the woman in question should be jailed.

Incidentally, people accused of sexual offences aren't the only ones at risk of violence from people who assume they're guilty.

Do you think people would take kindly to someone accused of murder, stealing from the elderly or torturing animals?

Of course not but again people still don't whine about how unfair it is that they aren't given anonymity.

Toads - great post

Even when a man is convicted of rape, he is given support, while his victim is subject to violence.

The rapist Ched Evans was supported by a huge number of people, while his victim had to change her identity twice due to the extreme harassment she received.

The idea that poor men are victimised is just TOTAL BOLLOCKS.

And another one

Also to just give a different perspective on this; if someone is falsely accused of a sexual offence then not having anonymity could in fact help clear their name if they had an alibi.

So let's just say John has been accused of raping someone and is reported in the news. Fred sees this and he thinks "hang on, that can't be true. John was with me when this rape is supposed to have happened."

I know that's a bit of a stretch but if the accused has an alibi then it might help clear him but that only works if people know who he is.

YABVVU

I can't put it into words right now how much I disagree with you, because I am not in a good place today, but I agree with everything TheSparowkawk has said.

It is opinions like yours, OP, that mean I am increasingly less likely to ever report my abuser.

Sorry if that last post sounds stupid. I realise that not everyone would have an alibi but if they did it might help.

There has to be a hell of a lot of evidence before it even goes to court though.

And could people please stop with the accusations ruins lives things. They really don't.

I know two people who have been accused of rape but then acquitted (note how I didn't say they were falsely accused because we don't actually know do we? Unlike others I do not just assume that an acquittal = false accusation) and their lives certainly aren't ruined. They both kept their jobs throughout the whole thing, they family and friends all stuck by them and virtually everyone in their hometown stuck by them and treated them no differently. Their lives have continued on as normal.

There are at least two actors (that I know of) on Coronation Street who have been accused of sexual offences yet people love them and any venom is aimed at the people who accused them.

I was sexually assaulted at work last year by a colleague. It wasn't rape but it was still serious enough for me to report it to the police and for the police to investigate it. Work were sympathetic at first - offering me time off, telling me that if I needed to talk that they were there, putting us both on separate shifts, etc.

When the case was dropped (it was my word against his and there were no witnesses) I was basically told by work that as the police couldn't do anything they couldn't do anything either. Nothing actually happened to him. He wasn't suspended or given a disciplinary. It wasn't noted in his personnel file (I was told all this btw). He was simply given a stern word and told not to do it again. He since carried on work as normal and it was actually me who was pressurized to leave which I now have done.

I'm sure if you were to ask him he would say he was falsely accused

So no I don't buy this crap that everyone accused has their lives ruined.

OP, you are a sexual assault survivor, do you not think it's right your attacker was named so others could come forward once they realised they were not alone?

Some people are found not guilty and it is because of a technicality. There was a paramedic who was accused of sexually assaulting a patient in the back of an ambulance . The CPS decided she was an unreliable witness ( I think she was semi conscious at the time because he was giving her the entonox) so they decided they would charge him with misconduct in public office - unfortunately, paramedics don't count as holding public office so the case was dismissed and he was therefore technically not guilty. Fortunately, paramedics are a regulated profession so he was struck off the register but he has no criminal record and is not on the sex offenders register.

I don't know his name and have blocked his face out and for the second i am not sure which of a group it was so it wouldn't help me.
Naming before charged does not help any victims because when someone is not prosecuted it make's it much harder for anyone to be believed. Maybe naming when charged depending on the case( so someone like Micheal Le Vell wouldn't be named because his case wouldn't have much change of other people coming forward)

Naming before charged does not help any victims

It does if it helps get a conviction.

when someone is not prosecuted it make's it much harder for anyone to be believed.

Then attitudes need to change.

People need to learn that no conviction does not = false accusation.

I think people who are charged should be named in order that others may then come forward.

As I understand it, Cliff was never charged so his name should not have been in the news.

I didn't think people were named before being charged anyway.

Suspects are named to allow witnesses/other victims/alibi corroborators to come forward. It helps the suspect as much as the victim. Having to keep suspects anonymous would be disastrous for the police - they wouldn't be able to investigate anything. How could you ask whether a witness saw a suspect without naming the suspect?????

Ordinary people don't tend to be but those who are of special public interest tend to be.

Can you imagine the scenario:

Police: We have suspect for the robbery of your shop Ms Smith. We need you to verify whether she was in your shop that day.
Ms. Smith: Oh great, ok what's her name, what does she look like?
Police: We can't tell you that.
Ms. Smith: Oh. So what do we do now?
Police: Nothing, sorry, that's the end of the investigation.

Sparrow - as 11122aa said, ordinary people don't tend to be named. It's usually something along the lines of 'a 31 year old male is being questioned'. Obviously the police have to question witnesses in all cases but they do not make it headline news.

I agree with everything Toads has said.

And furthermore, I have come to understand that the inevitable calls for anonymity for rape defendants, is an expression of male supremacy.

No other crime has regular calls for defendants to retain anonymity, however stigmatised the crime (mugging old ladies, stealing from charities etc.) Only rape. Because the trauma the tiny handful of men who get falsely accused will go through, really matters; we must protect them at all costs and if that means more rapists walk free (and it does, the data is absolutely crystal clear on that) then that's fine, because the trauma and pain women suffer, sometimes for decades, as a result of rape, simply isn't as important as men's pain. The idea that we should take serious steps to get justice for those women, is utterly ridiculous. Because they don't matter like the men matter.

If you didn't know we still lived in a patriarchy, this wildly skewed attitude to women's suffering versus men's, really ought to make you aware of it.

There is a difference from asking a witness to identify to announcing the name of a famous celebrity without actually appealing for any victims to come forward and taking nearly two years to investigate it anyway in the public eye.

The press regularly reports the names of 'regular' peoplewho are suspects in murders - don't you read the papers? The reason you don't remember the name is because it's not a well known person.

Here is an example of a 'regular' person who is a suspect in a murder. The report not only has his name but his photo.
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/08/suspect-in-line-dancing-murder-case-was-asylum-seeker-who-has-fl

OP, so it wouldn't help you but it does help others - can you not see that?