To share with you the reasons victims of rape should not share the contents of their phone with the police?

[Destinysdaughter]

This blog post starts with the simple line, because it’s victim blaming. To me, this is so clear and so beautifully written, from a woman who was worked with victims of sexual violence for ten years. So she knows what she’s talking about. I urge you to read this and think about it. To me, it will put women off reporting rape even more than they already do and is just taking things in the wrong direction.

Link

victimfocus.wordpress.com/2019/04/29/7-reasons-why-i-dont-support-police-checking-victims-mobile-phones-in-sexual-violence-cases/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

And just wanted to add, the percentage of false accusations, which is always used to justify these kinds of measures, is 2%. The same as any other kind of crimes...

Thank you OP. Saw this on the news yesterday and thought WTF. Why should a VICTIM of a crime have to give in their phone for scrutiny? What about the accused? It's abominable that in this day and age they are still looking to blame the victim. Truly appalling. It will almost certainly lead to fewer rapes being reported.

Why should a VICTIM of a crime have to give in their phone for scrutiny? Sadly because of some recent high profile cases where just such scrutiny provided evidence that the victim was not telling the truth. More misogyny... a woman lies, a man's reputation is harmed, a law is changed. Yet women die and men use a defence that is, in itself not legally possible, and get away with it!

The wish to believe all victims of rape is one I have long struggled with. I have never been able to join the #Ibelieveyou movement, even though I am part of #metoo

Social media, current ways of communicating, probably make this sort of scrutiny inevitable, victim and accused alike. HOWEVER the scope of scrutiny needs to be heavily regulated. Last 7 years and to be held for 100 years sounds way over the top to me.

So whilst I find the idea of such scrutiny abhorrent and invasive I don't think it will be going away. Maybe a concerted effort to have it more closely regulated, circumscribed would achieve a better result.

I haven't read the blog yet but I will. I'm not in the UK (I'm in Ireland) but saw this on the news. It's made me so angry. We usually end up following the UK with similar laws.

Do victims of theft, muggings etc. have 7 years worth of their data picked through for the sole purpose of finding something to show that they were asking for it? Of course not, men are victims of theft and muggings too so this would be considered ridiculous.

Why is it that rape victims have to go through even more victim blaming and even more shame and loss of privacy? It's almost as if half the population want to stop women reporting rape. I have 2 DD's. This is very troubling.

I didn't report being raped because I didn't want to be torn apart in court. This was nearly 30 years ago. The extra level of scrutiny by going through phones and tablets makes me feel sick.

I've just read the blog. It's excellent. Thanks Destinysdaughter.

It's made me even more angry. How can this be allowed?

I completely agreed with the blog as well

The reason being that women don’t always tell the truth. Phone evidence prevented Liam Allen from going to prison for ten years for a rape he didn’t commit. Doubtless I’m about to be flamed but I don’t want a young man’s life ruined because someone has made a false allegation against him and he’s convicted because evidence is withheld.

Placemarking

I haven’t read the blog yet, so a hefty caveat to start with. Sexual assaults are an extremely difficult area of law - in that it is very hard to do justice by the normal methods. The reason is that although there can be physical evidence of the crime, there very often isn’t and there are often no more witnesses than the complainant and defendant. Statistics about reporting aren’t decisive either since we don’t normally convict or fail to convict on the basis of a generalised statistical probability (assuming the stats are reliable to begin with). If the issue is whether the sex was consensual then the phone records might in some cases be relevant - but then there is the question of legitimate privacy.

In other words it is extremely difficult to devise a fair trial - fair for all, that is.

I would need to be convinced that text messages suggesting the women was sexually active would not be used as evidence against her. In fact, i can’t think of any text messages that would be relevant except any that are specifically saying “i had sex with Fred last night-I’m going to pretend he raped me” is going to be remotely relevant.

I'm sure many people have seen this Tracey Ullman clip, but for anyone who hasn't.... New laws are vile and despicable and a huge step backwards. The police do not want to protect me or my daughters. They are not on our side.

Alsohuman the difficulty is, in situations where the victim is clearly clearly telling the truth, the rapists are not convicted. As in the Ulster rugby case.

If I had had the courage to report my exh for raping me I would have happily handed over my phone. Evidence of his bullying and controlling manner may have actually aided my case....

The police don't make the laws , blaming police means nothing will change instead write to your MP.

Beach- and presumably you would have done-there is/was nothing stopping you.

My exh has received the worst punishment - my dc went nc with him.
That's more justice than a court could have given...

The article has seemingly reasonable points but neglects to mention that there may well be evidence that supports a rape victims case and would help secure a conviction - Geodata, times, photos of previous DV injuries, chats with friends about creepy/violent/arsehole blokes.

Just because we all watch Line of Duty and CSI and Silent Witness and think we know everything about Crime scenes and forensics and digital footprints etc doesn't mean that a victim of a crime would necessarily hand over the information that might secure a conviction - so trained detectives do the job on their behalf as they know what to look for and what is objective evidence and what would or wouldn't stand up Court.

We have to, at some point, accept that the Police and the Judiciary are there to uphold the law and help victims.

The article is more to do with the writers lack of trust in the wider judicial system than exposing a misogynistic conspiracy.

Problem is evidence in cases of this crime are often difficult if not impossible to prove. I do think mobiles of both parties could have curtail evidence which is needed to not make it solely be a case of he said she said

I don't have a problem with this to be honest. Rape and violent crime is increasing and will continue to increase. Anything to save the police time really.

nrpmum - you and me both, though in my case nearer 40 years ago. The guy was a supposed friend but I was most emphatically not on a date with him. Still furious with him stalking me for years afterwards and telling me he loved me. Bastard.

“The article has seemingly reasonable points but neglects to mention that there may well be evidence that supports a rape victims case and would help secure a conviction”

But presumably there’s nothing stopping a person using their phone as evidence now. It’s the compulsion that’s the issue.

As regards Liam Allan case. From what I can understand the text from the victim/accuser was talking about casual sex and having casual sex with Liam. This however does not mean that he did not rape her.
I know some people will say that this means a man cannot be ever found innocent or that I’m a man hater. But why is the man automatically believed over the woman if it’s a case of he said she said?

As we have seen in previous cases where it is obvious to anybody with an ounce of sense that women are being raped/killed by men and men are getting away with the defence of she asked for it or it was rough sex their words taken as being true.

It also strikes me as a little bit off that every time anything about false accusations comes up he is trotted out. If the ‘false accusers’ are to be believed there should be plenty of men willing to give interviews about how they have been falsely accused.
Plenty of men talking about how their lives have been ruined. However we don’t see this do we?

Sorry, my last post not exactly relevant to the thread. Got carried away with buried memories. But I don't like the possible consequences of rape victims having to hand over their phones - do the victims of any other crimes have to do this?
Digressing, did you see this www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/04/30/school-bus-driver-raped-year-old-he-wont-spend-day-prison/?utm_term=.585174374056? Unbelievable. Trivialising the victim's experience.