Rape victims must hand over phone or police won't pursue crime

[RedToothBrush]

Both Independent and Times carrying story on their front page.

This is going to backfire spectacularly.

I'm going to make another point.
If you are on benefits, having your phone confiscated is going to cause you serious problems. Having a second phone wont help because all your mobile gadgets are confiscated.

As a pp said: if there are any texts to the effect that the victim puts on a brave face, that will be used against her. In every other context this is unthinkable.

I love the repeatedly naive assumption that the police are just a completely neutral evidence gathering organisation with no ignorance or bias.

Given the evidence of their continued bias and incompetence as a wider organization that has actually led to women being killed by their partners due to the inaction of the police, and the involvement of the police officers themselves in dubious undercover activities, I'd say the assumption of police neutrality and professional evidence gathering that doesn't negatively impact the chances of raped and abused women getting justice pretty ironic, and not in an Alanis kind of way.

This woman will have to trawl for evidence that might be used to affect juries who think that skirts are relevant to the reason why a man is raping a woman.

That's your version of it, but this is what the laws demands of the CPS. This is s.3(1)(a) of the Criminal Procedure & Investigations Act 1996. The prosecution must “… disclose to the accused any prosecution material which has not previously been disclosed to the accused and which might reasonably be considered capable of undermining the case for the prosecution against the accused or of assisting the case for the accused”.

To me that sounds as if an effort is being made to conduct a fair trial.

Perhaps it's also time a defendants previous convictions were admissible in court as well.

Some posters have asked if messages on a handset have ever assisted in a conviction. The first rape I investigated had exactly that situation.

He admitted in an online conversation and I was able to prove he could have been the only person that sent that message.

Would he have been convicted without that? That’s impossible to say.

Oh and it came from her phone which she gave me when I asked for it. I can’t for the life of me remember if we had his phone or if the info had been deleted but either way, we got the info from her phone.

And officers in my force are not trained or authorised to interrogate phones so they are sent for digital download which takes month and months and months. I also have to submit the request specifically saying what I am looking for and why so it’s not a case of searching through her internet history or checking her photos from last year. We aren’t allowed to have a fishing trip and our enquiry has to be proportionate and justifications.

And suspects aren’t stupid, if they have any inkling we are coming for the, then the phone is long gone.

I agree with the consensus here. Would also like to make a small point that if the victim is claiming something like Universal Credit taking her phone could mean other serious repercussions like a benefit sanction.

helena Whilst that is unfortunate that’s not the polices issue.

And my force will buy a sexual assault victim a cheap payg to endure they have communications so that will remove that concern.

Hopefully all forces do that.

The consequences of losing your phone wrt benefits access is a very good example of the intersection of sexism and other factors of unfair discrimination and oppression.

Where is the sexism in removing phones? It happens in many serious enquiries, not just rape.

Yeah, nothing like the police represention on the thread saying 'Not our problem'. Farking 'ell. I'm so full of optimism that 'hopefully' the police will do the right thing. That's definitely the best basis for justice.

But the benefit issue isn’t the polices concern, is it? Did you conveniently ignore the rest of my post where I said we give our victims a phone so they have communication?

I didn't ignore it. I thought it was naively sweet that you were 'hopeful' other forces did the same. And I think you should probably read the rest of the thread and click on the links to Jessica Eaton's article to understand why your reassurances arent very reassuring at all.

Because I have no idea what other forces do. So I won’t assume they do the same as we do.

I have read the entire thread, but as per normal on mumsnet the experiences of a trained sexual offence police officer are rarely welcomed on these threads so I will bow out.

Again, a nice appeal to the authority of your position as a trained sexual offence police officer there, but you'll have to forgive me being unimpressed when you say in an earlier post that you dont see why it would be considered sexist to remove a woman's phone when she is a victim of rape given everything we've discussed on the thread. Like I said, not especially reassuring, given your position.

Haven't rtft yet.
I was raped age 15 by someone twice my age. I was an immature kid with a crush and he had been texting me (which I now recognise as grooming) for months. While we talked about sexual things, which was all very exciting to love-struck me, when it happened that I actually by chance found myself completely alone with him in a remote place, I was terrified and had zero intention of actually having sex. Sadly he did and it took the best part of ten years for me to accept I was the CHILD and he was the adult who should have known better. I did not report what happened out of shame. If I had had to hand my phone over, the police would have taken one look at those messages and assumed I was lying.
Whoever makes up these laws has NO fucking idea how complex rape is and the lasting damage it can do to victims. He's dead now anyway and I'm glad.

Why you take a victim's phone is the issue though.

I had no phone contact with either rapist. The first stole my phone, the second one had nothing relevant to the rape. So why take my phone (btw, in the second instance, my phone was not taken off me; in the first instance, the guy had stolen it).

Nicknacky. What do you think about leaving victims completely in the dark about what you know? I refused to give an interview, so I heard nothing until a month later when he had raped someone else. THEN you fucking contact me. You knew exactly who he was from day one. Why pretend you have no clue who it is when your searches would bring up exactly who it is?

Or do you not do simple searches when you go back to the office?

The description of mine was one you really couldn't mix up. It would have brought one hit. That was on google.

But police never did that for me? Why? Because I hadn't made a statement? Then why contact me a month later saying they've him in custody for another crime? Why not show me mugshots at the time. Why contact me a month later?????????? About a different crime???

It seems to me as though there is a clash here of real life experience of both the police and misogyny in general, and police procedure which purports to be helpful for the victim.

If it's someone's job to go through your life with a fine tooth comb to find something that the defence can use against you, things like sexual experience, purchasing decisions, social services records, pornography usage, should all be deemed out of bounds. And if the defence is using them, it should also be deemed out of bounds.

It cannot be beyond the wit of the police to ONLY access messages between the victim and the rapist in order to determine circumstance. And confiscate the phone for a day. I mean it's only actually the work of a day. Why would you need to hold onto it for days before, and days afterwards?

Aren't the police, as a cohort, pretty poor when it comes to exploitation of vulnerable people and domestic violence?

It's little wonder that women do not want to give them extra leverage.

And this is not me being dramatic, or hyperbolic. Many women have zero faith in the police when it comes to sex crimes.

Nicknacky Women shouldnt have to choose between a sanction and justice. Even if the force was to replace the phone many women wont want to take the RISK that they wont and is it even likely with all the cutbacks.

It is worth repeating that this is what happened to a woman when the police confiscated her phone in order to investigate her allegations of domestic abuse - she ended up with no way to summon help and was murdered!
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-dorset-42602852

Is there a petition started somewhere ?

have read the entire thread, but as per normal on mumsnet the experiences of a trained sexual offence police officer are rarely welcomed on these threads so I will bow out.

I suppose it depends if you think the system is working for rape victims or not. If you think it is you need to examine your prejudices very carefully.

So, if a woman has to resort to prostitution because without her phone there are issues with UC payout, that is not the police’s problem, eh? (Yes there are women on this site who went down that road due to botched UC roll out).

What the actual fuck?

(Also: you bet prostituting yourself will sink any chance your rape case might have had...)

I don't think that the actions of the police should end in the victim of a crime being made destitute and homeless through benefit sanctions. Or dead through not being able to call for help.