FFS. Woman jailed for 8mths after retracting rape accusation

[MmeLindt]

here

The woman retracted her claims after being bullied by her husband and family.

She was then prosecuted for falsely retracting claim.

WTF?

onagar...there are some that say rape within marriage is worse because it is personal and that stranger rape is an act of violence against a random woman

imagine being forced into sex by someone who is supposed to love you, have your best interests at heart

imagine the mental barriers that would have had to have been broken for a woman to have that happen to her, and then go on to continue consensual sex with him

Onager are you a victim of "different sorts" of rape? You seem to be very assured of how rape victims feel.

So we have

Rape in marriage is only rape if the woman leaves immediately

Proper rape is by strangers in bushes late at night, other sorts don't count as much.

There's rape, and rape-rape. Onager are you whoopie goldberg?

(Onager, you are the only person who introduced a hierarchy of bad and less bad rapes. It is really hard to read what you write and remain calm.)

The only possible reason for such an incredibly punitive sentence is to send a signal that her retraction undermines the judical process and makes conviction harder. But the signal that it sends is so chilling to women in its utter blindness to the disabling circumstances that they might find themselves in that it is more undermining of rape prosecution than the retraction itself might have been.

It says to women who are trapped in a severely manipulative, ennervating web of constraints that to enter the judicial system is to expose yourself in one more source of bewildering entanglement.

Really eight months! Even if it made sense to punish her, I can't comprehend the severity of that punishment.

How about "you are a victim of an ongoing campaign of violence and degradation, and so it's understandable that you did what you did"?

What the judge has said, as far as I can work out is "yes he raped you, but because you lied in your second statement, you need to go to prison. And him? Oh no, he can just carry on regardless." Is that right IYO? The judge has obviously decided that a "perfect lie detector" isn't needed as it's been decided that her second statement was a lie, and therefore the first one was true i.e. he raped her. So the judge has decided what is true and what isn't, but decided only to punish her for her statement, and not him for THE ACTUAL RAPING.

I really don't see in whose interests this is. Yes, she wasted police/courts time and money etc but, if they believe she is a victim of rape who in their right mind would really want to see her go down for this. i really can't see the judge, police, prosecutor being happy to punish her in this way. It is very strange and of course we are only seeing a snapshot of what really went on. As for the husband, unless he has had a trial then he isn't he considered innocent in the eyes of the law and I doubt any jury would have found him guilty in these circumstances if the woman is unwilling to testify.

I don't quite understand how they can get her for 'false retraction' if he has not yet been found guilty.

I'm not saying that he's not guilty, but unless he has been found guilty in court and then convicted, surely he is innocent until proven guilty.

you might think so curlymama. But apparently even the holy "innocent until proven guilty" rule is disposable if it means a chance to punish a woman who dares complain of rape.

It's very [confusing] curlymama.

eight months.

eight months

EIGHT MONTHS.

When this fucker as posted on the other thread got away with a suspended sentence for beating his wife until she passed out.

Absolutely disgusting. Shows such ignorance of domestic abuse and how victims act after years of manipulation, brainwashing and intimidation.

I have seen a lot of stories in the press recently about women jailed for 'crying rape.' The amount of publicity these cases are receiving is huge in comparison to the publicity raoe trials receive. All of this is going to put women off reporting rape to the police even more.

PS. What is TWS?

Think it's that twatty Wright Stuff programme.

Totally agree with your post doodle

The defence lawyer described E&Ms man's behaviour as "inappropriate", amongst other things.

Punching your wife to the ground and kicking her etc is "inappropriate"?

that poor woman will be spending Christmas in prison. maybe it's the first Christmas for a long time that she won't be beaten up or raped. there is something so very wrong with the world.

I watched TWS ad he dealt with this quite well though a few callers and panel member Craig Revels Hall (or whatever he;s called) thought she deserved it.

Good grief, did he really?

She's a Mum. If she's in prison now, whoo has the DCs? The rapist????????

MW was actually sympathetic to the woman. That Craig RH was a complete tosser. He saw it in only black and white- she lied therefore she must go to jail

Yes he was very harsh in regards to her - Mathew Wright was gobsmacked and looked quite uncomfortable with his strong opinion.

Craig R-H has difficult things in his past - it goes to show that those who you might expect to have sympathy, strangely often have harsher views. Sort of "well if I put up with this why can't you put up with that".

Mind you i didn't see the program so could be way off the mark.

Curlymama
It is very odd. It would be interesting to hear a legal perspective.

I am looking around the blogosphere to see if this is getting much press. I will not link to the blogs cryrape and another one as they will only make you self-combust.

this is a good one Policewoman blogger.

Guardian reports that she is going to appeal

Not much else online that I can see.

Ironic that the cat bin lady was in all the papers, and all over facebook. This is hardly being reported.