Big Brother wants 7 years data if you are a rape victim

[OldQueen1969]

www.theguardian.com/society/2020/jun/17/police-in-england-and-wales-dropping-inquiries-when-victims-refuse-to-hand-in-phones

Thought this might be of interest.

I think this was discussed on an older thread.

Anyway, my view is that it comes down to the courts, it's not the fault of the police.

I think this was discussed before too.
I’d hand my phone in. I have nothing to hide. It can do nothing but support my case if I were raped.

Yes it was discussed on an older thread, however this is a new article.

What if you did have something to hide, that had no bearing on your rape?

Something to hide that had no bearing on my rape?

Well, then just like my rapist, if I did a crime, then I’ll do the time. Although the justice system is actually very lenient with women. Especially traumatised women....
I’d take my chances to bring a rapist to justice. It would be hypocritical to demand justice for my rape but then try and get away Scott free from any crime I had done.

How would it work if your phone was a hot pulsing ball of "transphobia", like mine probably is.
Or any other "ism".

Everything is held against the woman in a rape case. A bigot might well lie about rape. Or just regretted the sex with a black/Italian/brexiteer person.

I saw this more recent report which updates the fact that the police have not accepted that what they were doing is a deterant.

It might help to get more to comments if the thread heading made this clear ie that is about the police NOT responding to earlier criticism.

It's not about having something to 'hide'. It's more that all manner of non related things could be used against you.

PlanDeRaccordement
So if there was evidence on my phone that I’d bought drugs and time
In the last 7 years, and I’m the victim If a sexual assault, I should be forced to choose between reporting my attacker (and risk arrest) or being denied any kind of justice?

Yes Lang.

Why wouldn’t you? Do you think that you are above the law? But not your rapist?

It's more that all manner of non related things could be used against you.

Anything not related to the rape cannot be used against you in court about the rape. It would be inadmissible. They can only use relevant evidence. What they are looking for is evidence of consent to sex. They don’t care about anything else for the rape case.

They’d have to start a separate case and charges against you, if you’d committed some other crime and was stupid enough to have evidence of it on your phone. Say, hate speech on 4chan or using BBC iplayer without a TV license.

Do they take the rapists phone off them?
I think it's outrageous, such a lot of personal info for them to trawl through. It's pretty violating, potentially, when someone had already been violated.
Why should a victim be investigated? It's immoral and gives the police a very easy get out to investigate further. It just protects the perpetrator really. Can people not see this?

What about all the personal stuff? Political opinions? If you watch porn on your phone, will that be used against you? What about confidential information about your family and friends? Private photos?

So what are they going to do with this information?

What if you don’t have it?
I don’t have my phones for the last 7 years, I don’t even have the same phone number or email accounts.

It's an outrageous way to treat a victim, would the people saying it is ok be happy for every text, photo and messenger conversation to be read by others? I can say there are texts I have sent in the last week I don't want people to read.

As for crimes, the victim is not being investigated as a suspect, the police shouldn't be trawling their phones as if they are.

Do they take the rapists phone off them?

Yes. The difference is that the accused has no choice. Their phone and computer, pad, etc are all seized. Only the victim is given a choice, but warned that without their phone evidence, they may not be able to proceed with a trial due to lack of evidence.

Why 7 years? Why not 3 months?

I don’t have my phones for the last 7 years, I don’t even have the same phone number or email accounts.

Lol. They don’t actually take your phone and keep it. They just ghost the data on the phone and any memory chips, takes five minutes. Then you sign permission for them to access the electronic data trail you’ve left behind via your sim and in the cloud and which are held in a database by your phone and internet provider(s). These companies are the ones with your data going back 7 yrs.

They don’t manually track through your texts, iMessages, etc either. They’ll first check and see if you knew your rapist and what communications you had prior to the day and time of the rape. They’ll check your location data to see that you actually were where you say the rape happened when it happened (won’t look at any other location data so if you were at a rave, or cage fight no worries) They’ll run facial recognition algorithm on your photos to see if the rapist is in a photo (not manual, like a search engine, only hits show up).

Really, it’s a deterrent because many people have put out misinformation and panicked women into thinking there will be an office full of detectives giggling over their selfies. It’s not like that. It targeted searches usually using algorithms. Think of your phone as the internet and all the police do us type into google key words to search for hits in your data. That’s it. They don’t have the people or time to go looking in every corner. There is too much data for that.

People saying they have nothing to hide are being naive.

Defence teams will use anything they can. For example participating in a MN thread about rape and how woeful the conviction rates and sentences are- could be used to try and imply you have falsified a rape claim to prove a point. Or if you had fallen out with your partner and had been texting a friend about how angry you were with him this could be used to suggest you accused him of rape as revenge.

Anything not related to the rape cannot be used against you in court about the rape.

Why would anything be used against the victim in a trial? The victim isn’t on trial.

What if you had previously consented to sex with a person who then went on to rape you?

Oh wow.

This came up a year or so ago I think, it was in the papers etc.

They were keeping the phones for a year or more. I assume you can't get another one with the same number? Anyway women without much cash it's not easily replaced.

Our phones are like a part of us now. So many people would have stuff in their phones they wouldn't happily let others see. How many men would be comfy with the police seeing their search history, even entirely legal stuff?

It's also the new knicker showing. Plenty of women sext, send pics etc. Who wants the police seeing that? Who wants it produced in court as proof they are immoral or whatever.

One famous case a while back, the fact the woman had texted him after was used to 'prove' there was no rape. The behaviour of women after rape is still not understood.

In addition. My phone has access to my work email, documents, chat channels etc. This is not rare. A lot of women work in areas that are sensitive or confidential. What happens? The police wouldn't let you log out of stuff, obviously. Work would not let you hand it over. Stalemate.

All of this came about because of some collapses in prosecutions. Not just of rape, of crimes across the board. The papers only reported that it was an issue in rape cases and did not mention the others at all. This sort of reporting really bothers me. It adds to the idea that rape cases are 'different' somehow.

Obviously handing over a phone will be a deterrent. Women are people, not angels. Who wants their saucy messages and pics with their ex read out and shown in court? What about women and girls in chaotic situations? The exploited girls in Rotherham etc, what do you you think some of their phone content was like? They were fucked up by what was going on. Probably messages not so pretty. Plus teen girls exaggerate a lot about experience etc, many teens from all backgrounds.

A glib 'I'd hand it in I've got nothing to hide' doesn't cut it. Is justice for rape victims if only those with totally 'clean' phone content can stand a chance of getting it? Are we back to the 'perfect victim'?

'Lol. They don’t actually take your phone and keep it. They just ghost the data on the phone and any memory chips, takes five minutes.'

Not sure this is the thread for a lol.

Anyway. The reports last year had women saying phones had been kept for over a year.

There was an initiative to say that should offer a phone as a replacement for while it was gone, to support low income women.

What is your expertise in this area, plan?

Do they take the rapists phone off them?

Yes, of course. I hate to say, do people not watch police procedurals? I realise they are fiction but looking through computer and phone data is a big deal now, that is also the case in real life.

This is also why they want and/or need the information from the victim as well. It's very unfortunate that when a crime happens and is investigated, it doesn't just blow open the life of the accused, it blows open the life of the victim. That is part of the larger tragedy of crime.

It's not a matter of the police being asshats. They just can't investigate if they aren't allowed to look at the things that will show what they need to show to get a conviction.

Similarly, if you want a rape case to go forward, you usually have to submit to a medical examination. That's equally if not more invasive than looking at phone data. If it happened in your home or car, you need to let them into your home or car.

So much of our life is online and recorded now.

Why wouldn’t you? Do you think that you are above the law? But not your rapist?

Its not just about crimes like say i bought drugs.

I can see a defence lawyer use the line of "she sent nudes to an boyfriend" against a victim. To show a casual blase attitude to sex or to say, see, she consented to him before if it was an ex partner