[ 2015-01-29 ]

Men must prove a woman said 'Yes' under tough new rape rules
Men accused of date rape will need to convince
police that a woman consented to sex as part of a
major change in the way sex offences are
investigated.

The Director of Public Prosecutions said it was
time for the legal system to move beyond the
concept of “no means no” to recognise
situations where women may have been unable to
give consent.

Alison Saunders said rape victims should no longer
be “blamed” by society if they are too drunk
to consent to sex, or if they simply freeze and
say nothing because they are terrified of their
attacker.

Instead, police and prosecutors must now put a
greater onus on rape suspects to demonstrate how
the complainant had consented “with full
capacity and freedom to do so”.

Campaigners described the move as “a huge step
forward” in ensuring fewer rapists escape
justice.

New guidance will be issued to all police forces
and prosecutors as part of a “toolkit” to move
rape investigations into the 21st century.

Mrs Saunders said: “For too long society has
blamed rape victims for confusing the issue of
consent - by drinking or dressing provocatively
for example - but it is not they who are confused,
it is society itself and we must challenge that.

“Consent to sexual activity is not a grey area -
in law it is clearly defined and must be given
fully and freely.

“It is not a crime to drink, but it is a crime
for a rapist to target someone who is no longer
capable of consenting to sex though drink.

“These tools take us well beyond the old saying
'no means no' - it is now well established that
many rape victims freeze rather than fight as a
protective and coping mechanism.

“We want police and prosecutors to make sure
they ask in every case where consent is the issue
- how did the suspect know the complainant was
saying yes and doing so freely and knowingly?”

Mrs Saunders, who was speaking at the first
National Crown Prosecution Service/Police
Conference on Rape Investigations and Prosecutions
in London, said the guidance should not only cover
situations where someone is incapacitated through
drink or drugs, but also where “a suspect held a
position of power over the potential victim - as a
teacher, an employer, a doctor or a fellow gang
member”.

The ability to consent to sex should also be
questioned where the complainant has mental health
problems, learning difficulties or was asleep or
unconscious at the time of the alleged attack, she
said.

The new guidance also covers domestic violence
situations and those where “the complainant may
be financially or otherwise dependent on their
alleged rapist”.

Around 85,000 women per year are victims of rape
in the UK, of whom 90 per cent know the
perpetrator.

The most recent figures showed that just 15,670
women reported rapes to the police, often because
they thought it would be impossible to prove the
offence, or because they did not have any
confidence in the police’s ability to help them,
with only 1,070 convictions resulting from the
2,910 cases that got to court

The rape conference was designed partly to address
the long-standing gulf between rape allegations
and convictions, as well as a variation between
different forces in the way they deal with rape
allegations.

Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Martin
Hewitt, the Association of Chief Police Officers
lead on adult sex offences, said: “As report
after report has shown, there is still far too
much variation in the way that forces move a
complaint of rape through the system.

“Reporting of sexual offences is up 22 per cent
in the latest statistics because of increased
confidence in our service and recording but we
have further to go.

“We need to tackle the iconic issues of 'no
further action' and, particularly, 'no crimes'
head on and reduce inconsistencies in our
processes so that we can send a clear and
unequivocal message to victims about how they will
be treated.”

Sarah Green, director of the End Violence Against
Women Coalition, said: “Although we have a long
way to go in securing justice for all survivors of
rape, the new guidance is a huge step forward in
that it will help ensure that juries are asked to
look in detail at the behaviour of defendants as
well as at that of the complainant.

“It makes clear that consent must be sought as
well as given, and it spells out issues around
power and vulnerability of some victims which
police, prosecutors and ultimately juries should
take into account.

“We believe that broader social attitudes are
slowly changing as, for example, we better
recognise that girls who are sexually exploited by
older men do not ‘consent’ to their abuse, and
that men in positions of power target and abuse
vulnerable victims.”

“Better recognition of and more justice for
these crimes will ultimately help increase the
deterrent to commit them.”

Source - The Telegraph

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