'Rapists' anonymity

[lostjanni]

Have been reading the post about the Irish rugby players and it got me thinking, do people accused of rape deserve anonymity until they're found guilty?

In my opinion yes, it was on the news a while ago that a man was accused and put through 15 months of he'll, lost his jobs, friends and family. And it turned out the girl had made it all up and had texts to prove she was lying. That guy suffered immenseley. And many do when wrongly accused. So I was thinking AIBU to think people accused of rape or sexual assault crimes should be kept anonymous until proven guilty?

I actually think it would be better for men wrongly accused of rape if the process was seen as being fairer to women. With such a low conviction rate, obviously there are going to be that an acquittal doesn't mean that the man is innocent.

I think that’s a good point Lizzie.

The officers who investigated the original rape case consistently refused to support prosecutors in bringing the case against her

Perhaps but the case met the test for bringing a public prosecution. If the accused had anonymity then it's unlikely he would have bothered to bring the private prosecution and then the case wouldn't have been taken over by the CPS and perhaps wouldn't have had such a tragic outcome.

Rape is also quite a unique crime in that it mostly exists in the minds of the alleged victim and perpetrator. Hence a woman can feel that she has been raped and a man can feel that he has not committed rape and they can both be right. You cannot really say the same for most other crimes.

A higher conviction rate is better for victims, better for falsely accused men, better for the justice system, better for police and better for women and girls.

And yet there is no great push to improve it. Which implies that there is some investment from the two groups who benefit from a low conviction rate; rapists and misogynists.

Sadly, I think you're absolutely right, @MrsTerryPratchett I think a lot of these rapists and misogynists are in positions of influence in the judicial system and in government. Vested interests.

Rape is a very difficult crime to prosecute. There are a number of factors for the low conviction rate, including the nature of the crime and the evidence (I.e. it often comes down to one person's word against another's and the burden of proof is very high). There are a number of academic articles discussing these issues at length. One of the issues though is prejudicial attitudes on the part of the jury, among both men and women. I don't think there is a conspiracy in the judicial system to keep conviction rates low. There is just no evidence for that. The truth is a lot more complicated and if you dig deeper you will see that the main issue is that rape cases are often dropped before trial because the evidence is not strong enough to secure a conviction. Again this is often simply due to the nature of the crime and the high burden of proof.

Yes because as this thread and another about the same trial yesterday show, there are far too many women who are partial to some 'guilt by statistics' thought when it comes to sex crimes.

throwcushions yeah I think you are right to some extent but it's also the inability of police to use all evidence at hand. The police in my case refused to accept that him admitting it online was evidence because the account was set up in his gaming identity not his real life one. They said it could have been hacked by anyone or that anyone could have set that account up (despite it be a very old account and linked to him probably in various ways like IP address). He had wiped all that account from all his electronic devices so they said they couldn't accept it as evidence because it was found on my device not on his. I think this was either lazy policing or they lacked the resources to be able to fully investigate.

When you read the evidence of this case i’m Glad they had the names published. Their behaviour was mysoginistic and entitled. They have not been found innocent but not guilty.

However false allegations or cases of mistaken identity should be redressed in the strongest of terms.

Mud sticks, and people are arseholes. Releasing the name only adds more fuel to the fire. If that man is innocent it'll ruin his life.

What like Ched Evans has had his life ruined? Or Donald Trump, Woody Allen, Harvey Weinstein?

I'll keep my sympathy for rape victims, thanks.

Absolutely not.
Agree with PP that there is no question of this for other crimes. Would you want it for people charged with paedophilia too?

I feel that rape is the crime where people are most likely to be assumed innocent until proven guilty, and often beyond, given the shockingly low conviction rate despite often compelling evidence.

Giving anonymity reinforces the myth that a significant number of rape claims are false.

Victims of rape already get a shit deal, let's not make it worse by treating the accused as a victim. They get the same legal process as everyone else accused of any other crime.

And let's not remember that because you are not convicted against all reasonable doubt, that the victim made it up.

Having followed the story in ulster, although they were not convicted of rape, I do not doubt the victim's experience and the impact it will have on the rest of her life.

@Avasarala only 4% of allegations are registered as suspect or false. Even those which are suspect are not necessarily false.

This includes "no crime" statistics where someone contacts the police concerned or someone else or because they have no memory of the incident and a physical exam or discussion with the reported victim shows no assault took place. These figures are also included in the false allegations figures.

We are talking about a tiny number of accused. Whilst it must be awful for them, O cannot see how we should be prioritising their needs over the 96+% of victims whose accounts are felt by police and the CPS to be genuine.

What was awful about the Irish Rugby trial was that the victim was cross examined for 8 days on the stand and the accused just half a day each. 8 days of bullying and trying to pick holes in her story, making her out to be a slut, a liar and not a victim. That doesn't happen in any other crime.

We should be focussing on the shocking conviction rate in the UK, not this myth that there are thousands of innocent men who have their lives ruined by this. If conviction rates were better, the stigma would go away, as people would assume not guilty meant that whereas we all know that is very often not the case.

Would you want it for people charged with paedophilia too?

Excellent point and if not, why not? Using some of the logic here, surely false accusations of paedophilia can be just as ruinous to a man's reputation?

Perhaps but the case met the test for bringing a public prosecution.

The CPS thought so, the police did not hence their non-cooperation.
The case was based on Economou spending a lot of money on a private prosecution and handing that over to CPS who didn’t hear de Freitas’ response. If she had spent the same amount of money and lobbied them with her side, the outcome might have been different.

Key to the CPS decision was CCTV in which the couple were kissing after the event, which belies a fundamental failure to grasp how rape happens within relationships. It proves nothing.

De Freitas had originally reported the incident, she said, to protect others from a “wealthy, psychopathic and dangerous” man.

The CPS ignored her bipolar and vulnerability, with the result that she is now dead. The coroner concluded that the imminent trial was a significant stressor in her taking her life.

She wrote to her defence solicitor:

“I am in utter disbelief about the decision of the CPS … I will regret reporting this to the Sapphire team for the rest of my life”

which sadly was not very long.

The CPS fucked up, of course they had to swear blind in parenthesis the case was strong to save their own skin.

@Situp

I know how small the number is and I certainly didn't say prioritise the falsely accused in those situations over the real victims.

The OP has asked if people think the accused should be kept anonymous, because in the very fee cases were it is proven the 'victim's lied, then it's not fair in the men who had their name published.

My answer to that is no, don't give them anonymity because our system needs to be open. But, in these cases, where it is completely proven that the accuser lied, their name should no longer be protected and they should be prosecuted. Then at least those men would be able to be clearly seen as innocent.

The situations are not mutually exclusive. We should also deal with conviction rate etc. But this thread was about how to deal with the truly innocent who have been faaley accused and the evidence shows the lies.

One of the issues though is prejudicial attitudes on the part of the jury, among both men and women. I don't think there is a conspiracy in the judicial system to keep conviction rates low.

Prejudicial attitudes on the part of the police and the judiciary too. Some judges belie weird and woeful attitudes to women. Defence barristers are more than happy to indulge rape myths and stoke prejudicial attitudes to help their case - those at the NI trial are a good example.

They are also more than happy to use past history if they possibly can, cf the Ched Evans case.

Ultimately the criminal justice system is still a patriarchal structure founded on masculine norms and tends to uphold the existing balance of power.

Tatiana my point re the de Freitas case stands. If the accused had anonymity there may not have been such a tragic outcome because it is unlikely that he would have pursued a private prosecution. As to whether the CPS made the right or wrong call, without having all of the evidence I don't think it is appropriate to comment really.

The question re paedophilia. It is almost opposite to rape as consent is never a factor and so doesn't pose that same he says she says difficulty.

Can you explain what you would change about the justice system to secure more convictions?

We don't give those charged with murder anonymity.

^^ very true. But equally, rape is the only crime where the alleged victim gets to keep anonymity, even if the rape is not proven/the alleged rapist is acquitted, but still named/shamed and wears the 'no smoke without fire' mantle.

That is where the inequality comes into play.

No, the accused just accuses the victim of being a liar or a fantasist. Children are often not believed, because people think he's such a good father/stepfather/uncle or whatever.

No it does not.

Anonymity is irrelevant. Economou may have pursued the case anyway.

That the defendant ended up dead shows she was not strong enough to stand trial, which shows the CPS made the wrong call irrespective of the merits of the case itself.

There would not have been such a tragic outcome if the CPS had not pursued a case against a mentally ill woman.

Sorry if this sounds thick but how exactly would anonymity prevent accused rapists from losing their jobs, family, friends, etc? Surely that could still happen because they would still be named throughout the investigation and their friends, family, co-workers, etc might even be interviewed as part of the investigation?

Not being allowed to be named in the press wouldn't actually stop people from knowing who he is and it wouldn't stop people talking and word spreading.

Unless you're suggesting that we simply stop investigating rape complaints completley because the accused might be innocent....

@Lizzie48

I don't know if that comment was at me or not. But if it was, I've been very specific in saying that they accuser should only be named and prosecuted when the evidence 100% backs up that they lied (like diary, text messages etc). Not just went the accused says "they lieing"

Sorry, I should have made it clear that it was @throwcushions I was replying to, her comment re paedophilia.

Twittle that's a very interesting insight. Thank you for sharing and I'm sorry for what happened to you. As to evidence, there are complex rules on what evidence is admissible and I won't pretend to know much about it. It could have been laziness/incompetence on their part or they could have been hamstrung by those rules. Either way I'm very sorry they didn't take it further.

That is another relevant point in terms of how many cases are brought to trial though - historically the police often didn't take rape claims seriously enough, particularly in DV cases, and this is still something you see in lots of other countries as being a real issue (e.g. in India). From things I've read I understand an accusation is now more likely to be handled appropriately and sensitively by the police but no doubt there are plenty of instances where it isn't and where improvements could still be made by working closely with charities like Rape Crisis.