Long wait for justice

A study into child abuse has uncovered the emotional turmoil suffered by victims and their families, writes Conor Ryan.

THE torment our criminal justice system piles upon young sex abuse victims has been revealed for the first time.

The comprehensive analysis of victims aged as young as two examined the cases dealt with by the Director of Public Prosecutions throughout 2002.

It was the first of its kind undertaken in Ireland and uncovered the delays experienced before justice was done and the emotional turmoil endured by abused children and their families.

It found:

* 12% of victims were aged between two and seven when they made their statement to gardaí.

* 17% of victims were younger than seven at the time of abuse.

* In 92% of cases the abuse lasts for less than a year, but one in every 50 victims suffered for more than five years.

* 14% of abuse was carried out by a complete stranger.

* Even in the quickest category of cases, after making a statement to gardaí, victims waited an average of 15 months to see justice and this despite their abuser pleading guilty.

The landmark study first emerged from Temple Street Children’s Hospital after requests from parents and children who attended two Dublin-based child sexual assault treatment units.

It was carried out through University College Dublin with St Clare’s Unit, Temple Street and St Louise’s Unit at Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital Crumlin.

The researchers examined 179 of the quickest cases dealt with by the Director of Public Prosecutions Office in 2002.

It was designed to give victims a clear understanding of the likely delays and what was the soonest they could expect to have their cases resolved.

In that year 580 child abuse complaints were referred to the DPP and of those 316 people were under the age of 18 when they made their statement to the police.

Yesterday the findings of the study were presented to the Psychological Society of Ireland’s annual conference in Killarney by a team led by senior clinical psychologist at St Clare’s unit, Dr Derek Deasy.

He said the findings give some indication of how traumatic the pursuit of justice can be for victims and where the court process causes unnecessary hardship.

“When we started doing this research the communication was very poor and victims did not know how their case was progressing or what would happen next.

“When you meet a child who makes a statement they expect they are going to go to court the next day to sort it out and do not understand how the process works, it can be very difficult for them when this doesn’t happen,” he said.

The study selected the cases where no queries had been raised because they were dealt with quickest, it allowed the researchers to track each development from start to finish.

Separately a selection of families were interviewed to give personal accounts of what it was like to try and get satisfaction from the justice system.

Researchers also surveyed the gardaí, solicitors, barristers and mental health professionals.

The resounding message from both victims and service providers was the experience of court was profoundly negative and biased against the wellbeing of those who suffered abuse.

The legal co-ordinator for the Rape Crisis Network Ireland, Kate Mulkerrins, said the justice system had to evolve to make it easier for victims to report crimes and have faith in justice being done.

She added that since the controversial Supreme Court ruling on statutory rape legislation the legal system has gone backwards by introducing the prospect of children having to give evidence in order to prove their abuser knew what age they were.

“The whole area of secondary victimisation is well documented and shows the traumatic experiences of victims in the justice system.

“Victims need to have faith in the system because without that they will not report because parents will think of what is best for their children and that is perfectly understandable,” she said.

Overall the psychological study showed shortcomings in the support offered to victims — only one quarter of victims had definitely attended a specialist service.

Dr Deasy said clinical psychologists wanted to see dedicated support services established in the courts to help underage victims.

“Ever since it was successfully challenged in the 1990s we as psychologists are not part of the criminal justice system so our assessment of the victims cannot be heard in evidence.

“Initial discussions have taken place to see if this can be resolved, but I don’t know where that will go,” he said.

The research is being presented at a time when key organisations are reforming the way they approach sensitive cases.

In October it emerged the gardaí had taken steps to improve its investigations in child abuse allegations.

This includes specially trained investigators in each division and 10 new interview apartments to allow children to be spoken to in an non-intimidating environment away from Garda stations.

According to the research, 35% of victims were less than 12-years-old when they were first interviewed by gardaí.

Dr Deasy said overall the research team found the gardaí receptive to the advice of clinical teams and certain changes had already come into being.

In the interview section of the research the majority of families had positive experiences about individual gardaí. However, the examination of the case files uncovered inherent delays throughout the investigation.

On average, it took six months after a statement was made before a file was submitted to the Director of Public Prosecutions.

The study only looked at cases where the Director of Public Prosecutions had specific queries on the police investigation, but it still took an average of 32 weeks before the courts heard guilty pleas arising out of the decision to prosecute.

Ms Mulkerrins said for all victims of sexual crimes these hold-ups make it harder to get over the initial crime. “Can you imagine going for 67 weeks not knowing waiting and not knowing what is going on or hearing anything for weeks or months,” she said.

The full research is due to be published in full in a psychology journal in 2008.