Found out someone I'm due to 'work' with tomorrow has a rape conviction

[UrsulaPandress]

I am scheduled to help out at an event tomorrow and I found out today that one of the organisers was jailed for rape a few years ago.

I am so not sure how to react. I don't know him well, but he has pissed me off on the odd occasion I have met him so I was not looking forward to spending the day with him, but this revelation has left me reeling.

I am not aware that I have ever met a bona fide offender before so I am searching my soul to see if I believe that someone should be presumed to have served their sentence and allowed to get on with their life. Or should I spit in his coffee every opportunity I get?

I reiterate - I am not in any danger. I was just pondering the morals and ethics.

Anyway, I'm here now. He's said hello and introduced himself. I've been polite. Hopefully that will be the end of our interaction.

I was only saying to 'hold your horses' in that just because a good friend tells you something, doesn't make it a fact.
I was saying 'hold your horses' to all of mumsnet before we are judge jury and executioner on someone without any facts.
once you have those facts you are entitled to do with them as you choose.
Good luck in your event today OP.

Thanks. It's a horse event 😜

Sweet Baby Cheesus

Is there some sort of internet bell that brings all the rape apologists to the thread???

no wonder rape culture exists - just look at this thread. What a fucking disgrace.

OP if I were you I would have withdrawn and told them why. If they want convicted rapists as volunteers, that is their decision, but one you find repellent, therefore you will volunteer elsewhere in the future.

This would concern me. I'm sure if posters were around someone with petty theft convictions they would all be watching their phones and handbags like hawks with barely a thought for the person having served their time.

As a PP said, the man has been punished by going to prison, but there is no guarantee that he is rehabilitated and remorseful. That should be the test really. Never mind that many people feel that prison sentances for rape are unjustly short.

He may not be a 'random' or opportunist rapist, for want of a better expression, but if convicted of raping his wife, this could be sustained and/ or repeated abuse.

Saying that he has served his term really does nothing to alleviate concerns as to his behaviour and the risk he poses.

Who (if anyone) is vouching for this man in the community? Is there anyone who can say if he is remorseful or simply at liberty again? I know that parole boards are supposed to assess risk but how effective are they really?

I coudn't work with a rapist, the disgust would be apparent if he saw my face.

no wonder rape culture exists - just look at this thread. What a fucking disgrace. OP if I were you I would have withdrawn and told them why. If they want convicted rapists as volunteers, that is their decision, but one you find repellent, therefore you will volunteer elsewhere in the future

Exactly.

I'd have to question the decision making ability and morals of an organisation/person in charge who'd let a known rapist work at their event.

I couldn't work with a rapist, the disgust would be apparent if he saw my face

Same.

I wouldn't do it, and I'd tell them why!

Yep, a convicted thief is a thief. A convicted rapist though? Calm down, you don't know all the facts.

If they are convicted then they are a rapist. Fact. Having served their sentence doesn't make them any less of a rapist.

It will not be the first time you have worked with a rapist, or the last. The difference here is that you know.

It's sickening to read so many women minimising rape
This situation is rape culture in a nutshell; the guy gets to go on with his life with everyone being quite lovely to him, the victim is forgotten and gets to live with whatever trauma was sustained forever, and strangers on the Internet minimise what the rapist did.

I could never take the "Done his time" view for a sex crime. A rapist stays a rapist.

If I was told that person X was a rapist I'd be treating it like any other gossip, ie, with detachment.

I would also watch him like a hawk.

I wouldn't do or say anything though.

I could never take the "Done his time" view for a sex crime. A rapist stays a rapist

Yes, this. I'd work with a thief. Even with a murderer I might be inclined to think "you've done your time" (depending on circumstance) but a convicted rapist? Not a chance. It's so difficult to get a conviction for rape that the case would have to be so clear cut. And basically that's someone who views women as a piece of meat to do with as they will. That's not an attitude that will fundamentally shift. Nope.

Found out today that it was a bottle.

Bottle?

He raped a bottle.

He used a bottle.

Oh my god that is sick. And to his wife.

Awful.

What a repulsive specimen.

And I've worked with sex offenders in a professional capacity.

That's gbh surely?! (Not that I'm minimising rape).