THE State is inflicting “mental torture” on rape victims due to widespread delays in bringing cases to court, support groups have warned.

IT is appalling that victims of sexual abuse are waiting up to two years before receiving full-time counselling support from a State scheme set up to help people recover after their traumatic experience.

FURTHER evidence of the funding crisis hitting services for rape and abuse victims has emerged with the Rape Crisis Network Ireland (RCNI) revealing its members have less than two-thirds the budget they need to survive.

JUST 95 out of 335 people who sought counselling at the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre (DRCC) reported the crime to gardaí.

There were 16,331 calls made to the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre in 2005, according to the centre’s annual report published yesterday.

THE Broadcasting Complaints Commission received more than 25 phone complaints before lunchtime yesterday regarding Friday’s Late Late Show featuring convicted American paedophile Jake Goldenflame.

MORE than 3,000 people demonstrated nationwide yesterday to show solidarity with victims of child abuse.

HUNDREDS of protesters are expected to gather outside the Dáil today as public outrage intensifies over the child rape debacle.

In the final part of a three-part series, Conor Ryanlooks at the case of a 13-year-old girl who a court ruled consented to sex with her 41-year-old abuser.

FOUR out of 10 people agree with the controversial view that women who drink or take drugs are partly or completely at fault if they are raped.

TODAY we publish a deeply disturbing survey on rape and rape victims that should make us all stop and think about how we judge women, their attackers and our society’s attitude towards what provokes sexual crimes.

THE two Saturdays during Christmas each saw eight victims of sexual assault treated at the specialist unit in the Rotunda Hospital — including one person who had to make a 10-hour return trip from Donegal.

VICTIMS’ groups have expressed alarm at the continuing drop in reports of sex crimes to gardaí at a time when more people are seeking counselling.

A TEXT helpline aimed at young people with problems has been getting 120 appeals for help per day since its launch last August.

THE Rape Crisis Network Ireland has criticised the Garda authorities for not including sexual violence as a policing priority for next year.

YOUR report on Jackie Hayden’s book, A Man in a Woman’s World (December 10), says he was the first man to hold the position of chairperson in the Rape Crisis Network.

FOR Michael D Higgins, it was a book of prose, for Willie O’Dea it was African mines, for Jackie Healy Rae a room to meet with his people in Killarney, and for Bertie Ahern a few free tickets to the dogs.

FOLLOWING a special meeting of the Violence Against Women (VAW) non-governmental sector, we strongly rejected the recently announced COSC: the Irish Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence (Irish Examiner, May 17).

YOUNG people are still not protected from sexual exploitation, the country’s leading rape crisis agency said yesterday.

Miriam Duffy from the Limerick Rape Crisis Centre (LRCC) borrows this quote to show there is no ambiguity on its stance towards pornography.