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For years, [Madison, Wis] police and city lawyers refused to believe a blind woman who said an intruder raped her at knifepoint. They even charged her with lying about it. Now, five years after DNA connected a sex offender to the attack, the city has apologized to the woman, known as Patty, and is offering her $35,000. Outraged by a book detailing her skeptical treatment by authorities, the City Council approved the payment last month and ordered police to draw up new policies for interviewing crime victims. […]
The resolution gives Police Chief Noble Wray 90 days to recommend new techniques for interviewing of victims of sensitive crimes, including how to eliminate “the use of lies, coercion, deception, ruses or other techniques designed to break down individuals” in all but the rarest of circumstances.
This non-monetary portion of the resolution is something that all police forces should resolve to do. Rape victims deserve to be treated ethically and not with assumptions that they are criminals who must be broken.
It shouldn’t take the publication of a book such as Cry Rape: The True Story of One Woman’s Harrowing Quest for Justice
In 2001, the state crime lab discovered that DNA from Joseph Bong, a convicted sex offender, matched the semen. Bong was convicted of Patty’s rape in 2004 and sentenced to 50 years in prison.
I wish all cases where the police refuse to believe real rape victims ended with the conviction of the rapist and the clearing of the rape victim’s good name, but that just isn’t the reality for most rape victims who are treated like they are the real criminals.
(crossposted at my blog, Abyss2hope)
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I agree with the article whole heartidly when it speaks about how the questioning of rape victims needs to be different than the questioning of assumed rapists. I think that even in the cases where rape victims are lying, it would come out through a much more compassionate, justice-minded, “we believe you” line of questioning. With rape victims it should center around getting the story, whatever that may be in the end, and with suspected rapists it should be about interrogation. Investigators should go in the latter with extreme doubt and skepticism about what the “accused” says. Yet even then, there are many “rapists” who are falsely convicted. I think interrogation in general needs to change and that is the real lesson that comes out of this.
I, too, wish all cases could end like this.
“Yet even then, there are many “rapists” who are falsely convicted.”
Cite, please.
Daran wrote a good post about the number of men falsely convicted of rape who have been exonerated by DNA evidence. The number of such cases appears to be quite low (although as Daran says, even one is too many).
However, of course we can’t eliminate the possibility that there are a lot of cases out there in which falsely convicted rapists have not been exonerated. However, I can’t imagine any way of counting such cases, so I don’t think it’s a question which can be addressed empirically.
Okay, while I’m glad to see that they’re implementing what seem to be some pretty good policy changes, I’m kind of horrified at them offering her the 35k to make nice. It’s like, whoops, first you were raped in your apartment, and then by the justice system; we’re sorry, take this money. The hell? I didn’t notice her response to their offering in the article – anybody know what she’s said, or if that covers her legal fees, or what the logic behind it is? Hrm. Mixed feelings.
Just because one man is exonerated, does it naturally follow that another man did not rape the woman in question ?
As others have pointed out, rape stands out from other crimes in the sense that this prospect seems extraordinary to a lot of observers. Yet how often in cases of theft or assault does the average person make an instant, fuzzy-minded leap from the news that the wrong person was acused of the crime to the assumption that there was no crime at all ?
“However, of course we can’t eliminate the possibility that there are a lot of cases out there in which falsely convicted rapists have not been exonerated. However, I can’t imagine any way of counting such cases, so I don’t think it’s a question which can be addressed empirically. ”
Okay.
But the claim that there are “many” rapists who are falsely convicted, a claim which, seems to me (perhaps wrongly), sounds correlated to the claim that there are “many” false accusations.
Ms_xeno, I think it’s one of the many facets of how people confuse rape with sex. After all, people generally know who they’re having sex with, so if one says “Joe Schmoe had sex with me” and he didn’t, one generally knows that this is false at the time. But of course the reality of the thing is that rape is not sex at all, but is a crime, and someone who sets out to commit a non-date rape is not going to announce their identity any more than a bank robber would.
I hope that this leads to viseotaped interviews, as the city suggested. I don’t know why police don’t all accept videotaping interviews. Actually, I do know, but since most of the rest of us can’t conduct the most important part of of jobs in secret, neither should they.
Elena, it will definitely take more than videotaping interviews to correct this problem, but I agree that interrogations should be recorded so those who are mistreated have more than their word to back up their claims of mistreatment.
The 35K isn’t much, admittedly, but its given directly by the city council voluntarily. It would have been more, but our state and local budgets are pretty well screwed right now.
I imagine she’ll get a good bit more when she sues, which I desperately hope she will.
The 35,000 was to cover legal fees. From what I read the policy change was more important to her.
This is also touchy in a town more recently known for Audrey Seiler.
I was falsely accused of a crime. I was a victim and it hurt.
This poor woman was a victim, then was victimized by the system. My pain is nothing compared to what she has gone through. I know our legal systems are imperfect at best, but please.
I pray that the pain that this woman has endured is washed away. I also pray that we are all in less of a hurry to judge others and throw stones.