Rape crisis - Lack of trust in judicial decisions

PERSISTENT warnings that rape victims would stop reporting sex attacks if they failed to get justice in the courts are borne out by a dramatic fall in cases coming before the gardaí.

There can be no other plausible explanation for the sudden drop of more than 44% in the number of reported cases in the first quarter of this year. To suggest the incidence of this most heinous of crimes has suddenly plummeted overnight and that Ireland’s rape crisis is diminishing stretches credulity to the limit.

Unsurprisingly, this country’s shabby treatment of rape victims has been made an election issue by the Rape Crisis Network which calls for changes in legislation with the aim of ensuring that victims get fairer treatment in future than they are receiving under the existing system.

Besides demanding more specialised training for the gardaí, campaigners also want the next government to undertake extensive reforms of the legal system. Above all, a sea change of attitudes towards rape victims is warranted in the court room.

However, reflecting the low priority of rape on the political radar screen, not a single election candidate turned up at yesterday’s press conference which heard that out of 446 rapes reported to the gardaí in 2004, some 130 reached the DPP and of those one in three ended with convictions.

In the first quarter of this year, the number of rape reports plummeted by over 44%. Arguably, this reflects a disturbing lack of confidence in the justice system.

All too often, under the adversarial legal process, victims face aggressive cross examination, invariably ending up being portrayed as the wrong-doers and the perpetrators depicted as the victims.

Genuine cause for concern arises from the appalling inconsistency of judicial rulings and particularly the leniency of sentences handed down by judges who sometimes appear out of touch with the realities of life in a society undergoing rapid change.

Anecdotally, the number of rape victims going to the gardaí tends to fall sharply in times of public controversy over judicial decisions. By coincidence, the downturn coincided with the outcome of a recent case in which the rape victim felt so wronged by the three-year suspended sentence handed down to the perpetrator that she took the unusual and courageous step of waiving her right to anonymity.

Having fled the court in a state of shock, Mary Shannon had to endure the ordeal of travelling home to Clare on the same train as the rapist, and suffering the outrageous experience of having a cigarette butt flicked at her by the aggressor when they off the train.

Following widespread anger and confusion over the sentence meted out in the Central Criminal Court to a man who had raped a mother of three in her home, the Director of Public Prosecutions has appealed its leniency and the case is expected to be mentioned in court the week after next.

Meanwhile, it has to be asked whether attitudes to rape are influenced by the fact than men dominate the Garda Siochána, the Department of Justice, the judiciary and other agencies of the State dealing with this issue. This begs the question whether, if there were more women in the system, rape victims would be treated with greater sympathy and if more rapists would receive a greater dose of realism and be dealt with more sternly.

The erratic nature of judicial sentencing means the prospect of securing justice for the perpetrators of this grave crime is something of a lottery. That is a scandalous situation which must be tackled.