She Didn T Fight Back Shaila Dewan Analysis

An American is sexually assaulted every 98 seconds, and every 8 minutes, that victim is a child. Only 310 out of 1,000 assaults are reported, but only 6 out of 1,000 perpetrators end up in prison (RAINN). Although sexual assault is egregious, these perpetrators are less likely to end up in prison than other criminals. The reason that is seems to be that victims do not report their cases. So why are sexual assault victims afraid to share their stories? Victims often do not report their assault because of many reasons, including the fear of reprisal, the belief that the police could not and would not do anything about the case, or because they simply did not know how to approach an official.

The introduction of Nils Christie’s ‘Ideal victim’ theory (1986: 18) refers to victims of crime who can attain the status of a legitimate victim in the eyes of the public. Christie outlines a criteria which needs to be followed in order to gain this full status of a ‘legitimate victim’. Christie’s ‘ideal victim’ however is not the same as a legal victim and often real victims of crime deviate far from the concept of the ideal victim (Beck & Janbakhsh 2010). This therefore means that using Christie’s ideal victim theory to give someone the title of a legitimate victim is often detrimental. Male victims of sexual assault often deviate from the ‘ideal victim’ criteria set out by Christie, this means that when they encounter the justice system, their experiences are often marginalised or discounted entirely.

When prosecuting criminal domestic violence cases too many officers constructed their entire case only on statements made by the victim. However, “victims of domestic violence are more likely than victims of other violent crime to recant or refuse to cooperate in prosecutorial efforts” (Breitenbach, 2008, p. 1256). Officers must consider that victims of domestic violence may refuse to testify because of fear of retaliation, intimidation, financial dependence, emotional attachment, and/or because they reunited with the batterer. If the victim refused to testify during court, their statement against the abuser becomes hearsay evidence. Several recent cases have had a huge influence on how those statements and hearsay evidence may be

Steven Whitacre experienced a very traumatic childhood of abuse from his father which led to a very difficult adulthood. In his book “My Fathers Prostitute”, he talks about his life, starting out when his father first abused him to more recent times in adulthood to where he finally sought help and started to move on in his life started to live the life he should and deserves. This book really opened my eyes on what all goes on in this world that I would have never guessed. “Every eight minutes, a child is sexually assaulted in the U.S., and 93% know the perpetrator” (“Adult Survivors of Childhood”). To me this statistic seems insane and I cannot ever imagine being sexually assaulted by anyone let alone one of my parents that I am supposed to trust and love. When you really think about it, that how every eight minutes a child is getting sexually assaulted it is astonishing. It makes me wonder how many people I know that I have been sexually assaulted but don’t tell anyone. I assume there are many different cases of sexual assault and how there are different levels of how traumatic they are to the individual someone came upon. With some people, the sexual assault only happened once, and with others like the author of My Fathers Prostitute it happens during their entire childhood to impact the individual even more. I am not saying that the individuals who have only been sexually assaulted once came out un hurt or traumatized, but I would just imagine that it would not leave

“I never realized that once I was labeled as a criminal, I had forfeited my right to be considered a victim,” says Elizabeth Reid at the end of an article she wrote describing her horrific experience as a resident at one of Washington Department of Corrections Work Release facilities (Reid 2013). Elizabeth was led to a secluded room of the facility where she was raped by one of the staff/ guards. She was forced to face the wall as he forcibly raped her. At first she did not report the rape because she feared that he would cause her to be sent back to prison. However, instead of telling someone inside the facility, she went to the local police to report the rape. To her amazement, the cops did not follow through because they were informed that she was on a form of supervised release. As a result, Elizabeth’s rapist was never charged or apprehended for her rape. Sexual misconduct between female inmates and male correctional officers (CO) has been a problem that

"Sexual assault charges need to be taken seriously at all times, as they are often a matter of he said/she said. Proving

Gray, Eliza. "Campus Sexual Assault: Why Don't victims Go To Police?" Time. Time, 23 June 2014. Web. 09 May 2017

Violence against women is very risky and is often prolonged. Among those who do contact the police, some may decide not to file charges against the attacker for many reasons. Financial threat; fear of further violence; and fear of losing the children, their home, employment or family are just a few. (Bostock, 2009) The mental strain and fear of

Whenever a survivor recounts their experiences with intimate partner violence (IPV), one may think how does the perpetrator keep doing what they are doing and not see it as being wrong. Often, perpetrators rarely believe they are that they are abusers and rarely take total responsibility for their actions. They also normalize their actions by believing that certain types of abuse are more prevalent in society, perpetrators estimate that IPV is prevalent twice as much as the national average, and rape is prevalent three times as much as the national average (Miller-Perrin et al, 2017, p. 288). This can become an issue especially in the idea of treatment sessions with these men and women. If they don’t accept what they did was wrong, then treatment

Over the years, there has been a lot of sexual violence. According to the RAINN Campus Sexual Violence Statistics, Only 310 out of 1000 cases of assault are reported. The other 690 rape cases are not reported because the victims are terrified to come forward. This is so because they do not believe that they would be believed or because of being disowned or called horrible names. The 310 cases that are reported take a lot of time to process and gather evidence to prosecute the offenders. Some individuals believe that the offenders are only innocent, that the victims are either at fault for making up the story or that the justice system is using religion to prosecute these criminals. This study was done to show that religion is not a fact of

In every sexual assault investigation there is a substantial amount unseen to the public eye. Intrusive medicals, intense questioning and irreversible consequences. Sexual assault is classed as one of the more major crimes, with logical reason. This understandably is why allegations aren’t taken lightly. Investigations are intense and review everything about the accused characteristics and life choices, even from 10 years ago but where is the vigorous investigation into the accuser. Are the accused assumed guilty from

In different social context, sexual crime victims may respond differently toward the notifying decision, especially for the crime victims involved in the personal reputation or even family honor issues in specific religious and social context. The reporting decision even may put victims at risk of being heavily injured or even murdered (Zhou changjun, 2010). To some extent, victims from such kind of social context tend to keep silent to being raped experience because of extreme shame deeply rooted in social culture and anxiety to any possible scandal and rigor

Some women acquiesce out of a need for self-preservation as evidenced by my interview of Jane (J. Smith, personal communication, March 22, 2017), a 55-year-old divorced female victim of marital rape and sexual assault. She stated she was excessively coerced and bullied into giving in to unwanted sexual intercourse. Jane has a history of several physical disabilities, surgeries and ailments. As Jane recounted some of her experiences, she related the horror of being raped by her husband after her physician ordered her to abstain from intercourse after the birth of her daughter. Not only, did she suffer through the physical pain of rape, she also suffered emotionally and mentally because the violations came from her husband. She relayed to me that she had lived in a constant state of fear, anxiety and depression until her divorce was finalized and she obtained a lifetime restraining order against her ex husband. She added that she engaged in a pattern of abusive relationships for the next several years. Jane stated, “People feel that rape by one’s husband can’t be as bad as rape by a stranger but it’s worse”. She is a successful single woman now, however she suffers from posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which requires medication and

But the culture of entitlement and denial, sometimes called rape culture, that too often keeps sex-crime victims silent does not mean that the victims “let” you do anything, even if they felt too powerless to seek recourse.

Many victims of rape do not report their crime to the police. There are many factors into what influences a rape victim to report to the police. It is through that personal interactions that influences how a victim will proceed or withdraw their claim. This interaction is crucial since it often sets the tone to how the victim will view and heal from the crime. Police play a major forefront to this victim’s interaction and if police officers come in with their own prejudices and bias it can greatly affect the victim’s reaction to the crime. Within a literature review authored by Parratt and Pina (2017), they looked at previous research on how rape myths held by police officers effected victim reporting, decision-making from police officers,