10 ms·

Rape victims among those to be asked to hand phones to police

47 points by vesinisa 8y ago

dragonwriter 8y ago
This seems broadly in line (but less intrusive, and less protective of defendant's rights) with what has always been US practice in that no one is immune to being compelled to provide evidence except for very specific privileges. Not only can police/people ask for this information in the US (and the British use appears to be purely voluntary but with potential impacts on prosecution if it does not), but also either the prosecution or defense can issue subpoenas or secure court orders for evidence in the possession of victims or other parties.
55555 8y ago
'Fake' rape reports are a growing problem and the cases I have seen haven't resulted in any punishment for the accuser. I mean, obviously this isn't the best solution to the problem, but it's by far the easiest and cheapest for the taxpayer. It's evidence that would probably be required for the case in court anyway, right?
- fabricexpert 8y ago
  No- the prosecution does not have to search for and provide evidence that may exonerate the defense, that would be ridiculous.
  - throw_political 8y ago
    > the prosecution does not have to search for and provide evidence that may exonerate the defense Nobody said the prosecution had to do anything. Where do you think you saw that? But the police are required to investigate. It has been the police who have been at fault, and censored rightly so, for not finding this evidence in these cases.
  - JarlUlvi 8y ago
    In the US, the Law is clear - the Prosecution must expose exculpatory evidence to the Defense as a part of discovery.
  - FakeComments 8y ago
    They don’t have to search for it, but they do have to provide any exonerating evidence they discover in the course of their investigation. That’s part of “discovery”, and cases have been thrown out because prosecutors concealed exculpatory evidence from the defense.
    - DanBC 8y ago
      It's what happened in the Liam Allen case which triggers this new guidance.
  - hacknat 8y ago
    No, but the defense can and probably will subpoena these things. As a prosecutor you’d be dumb not to look at evidence you guess will come out at trial anyways.
  - pdpi 8y ago
    We can argue about whether criminal law should focus on punishment or rehabilitation, but it should be completely evident that it's about punishing/rehabilitating the right person. Criminal prosecution isn't a game you're trying to win. If the investigation surfaces any evidence at all that the defendant might be innocent (or hints at the existence of said evidence), it's a gross miscarriage of justice not to bring this evidence forward.
  - DanBC 8y ago
    In England: https://twitter.com/BarristerSecret/status/1122824178720055296 https://twitter.com/BarristerSecret/status/11228241787200552... > The prosecution is under a duty to pursue all reasonable lines of enquiry in an investigation, and to disclose to the defence any material it uncovers which may be reasonably capable of undermining the prosecution case or assisting the defence.
- village-idiot 8y ago
  Got any statistics on that being a growing problem?
  - JarlUlvi 8y ago
    The statistics behind fake rape accusations are all over the roadmap. This is a good article on the subject https://www.vox.com/2015/6/1/8687479/lie-rape-statistics https://www.vox.com/2015/6/1/8687479/lie-rape-statistics
- DanBC 8y ago
  In the UK they're not a growing problem, they're very rare, and the police rigorously prosecute them. https://www.buzzfeed.com/katiejmbaker/vulnerable-women-routinely-jailed-false-rape https://www.buzzfeed.com/katiejmbaker/vulnerable-women-routi...
  - chmod775 8y ago
    That article gives me the chills, treating false rape allegations as if it was some trivial "no harm done" kind of thing. It's a serious matter. It's up there with allegations of murder, except that people who are cleared of murder generally face less prejudice and discrimination than people cleared of rape. Intentionally making false allegations should carry a sentence proportionate to the alleged crime, not to mention compensation for harm done to the reputation of the accused. Most of these people got off easy. The article also glosses over the fact that most of them were found guilty by a jury, whereas if the alleged rapists would've been found guilty, nobody would've spared them a second thought or cried foul.
    - DanBC 8y ago
      Except in most of these cases the allegations aren't false, and harm was done. The harm isn't being done to the abusive men, but to the vulnerable women. And, in the context of rape, false allegations are vanishinly rare. In the UK commonly accepted figures say there are 90,000 rapes each year (and the real number is likely to be higher). That's a huge number of people who aren't seeing justice.
      - chmod775 8y ago
        > Except in most of these cases the allegations aren't false, and harm was done. The harm isn't being done to the abusive men, but to the vulnerable women. There was not only no evidence of any crime committed by the accused, there was evidence of the accusers lying. A jury, after being presented evidence by both sides, first found the accused not guilty. Later, a different jury, after being presented evidence by two sides, found the accusers guilty of lying. What makes you so confident that, after reading an article that is objectively one-sided, you have a better grasp of the situation than the jurors in question? This absolutely boggles my mind. Maybe they all have been found not guilty by another jury by now and I just glossed over that fact?
- theon144 8y ago
  >I mean, obviously this isn't the best solution to the problem, but it's by far the easiest and cheapest for the taxpayer. If your "easiest and cheapest" solution involves the violation of liberties, let alone people in vulnerable positions such as rape victims, you might wish to rethink it. > It's evidence that would probably be required for the case in court anyway, right? If you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear, right? I genuinely don't understand how this is still a valid argument in the minds of some people. Yes, it might probably be required, but the law was written like this for a reason. You're further disincentivizing rape victims from reporting the crime, which already is a huge issue due to stigmatization and the psychological trauma. --- And as others have mentioned, I would like to see a source on "'Fake' rape reports being a growing problem", that would warrant this kind of response.
  - throw_political 8y ago
    'Alleged victims' you mean, right? Whoops.
- braythwayt 8y ago
  Let’s flip this over. In the case of a woman who is murdered and who has a male partner, it is nearly ALWAYS the partner. It isn’t a growing problem, it has been with us forever. Now obviously, the easiest and cheapest thing for the taxpayer would be to simply lock up the partner when a woman with a partner is murdered. That would be unjust, even if it is nearly always right and easiest and cheapest. Ok, but MRA folks would go ballistic, so let’s make it easier: If a woman with a male partner is murdered, we simply require the male partner to give up their cell phone’s contents. No silly paperwork for a warrant, no laws about self-incrimination or any of that, we just cite the “Taxpayer’s Efficiency Act of 2019” and they have to hand it over, or sit in jail for contempt until they do. Is that still unjust? It is, isn’t it? I put it to you that if false accusations of rape, which happen rarely, justify examining phones belonging to the victims, then murder of a woman by her male partner, who is usually the perpetrator, justifies the exact same thing. What stops us in both cases is the notion of justice. It is unjust whether the person is likely or unlikely to b a law-breaker. And we as a society have decided that justice is a greater good than saving a few bucks or making things easier for police.
  - 5trokerac3 8y ago
    There's a huge difference between incarcerating someone and getting a warrant for their phone records. Your analogy is made less relevant by the fact that if a woman is murdered they very likely would get a warrant for her partner's phone records. Where the 4th amendment applies here is if any evidence of a different crime were found while looking for information on the first. If the phone records were acquired by a warrant, that evidence would not be admissible in court.
    - braythwayt 8y ago
      Not at all, you said the magic word: “Warrant.” A warrant involves judicial oversight. Warrantless searches do not.
      - 5trokerac3 8y ago
        It is your responsibility to protect your 4A rights. This is why you never let the police in your house without a warrant. Inviting them in allows them to search and charge you based on anything they find. Step outside and talk to them if they want to interview you, and password protect your phone and demand they get a warrant if they want to look at it.
- braythwayt 8y ago
  I want to respond separately to the notion of fake reports being a “growing problem.” You haven’t cited any evidence, so I don’t know is this is true or if you are just repeating something somebody said on the internet. But if there was some evidence along these lines, my first question would be whether rape reports are growing. One thing that used to happen was that there was an enormous amount of disincentive to report rape. Society assumed by default that the woman was “asking for it.” The defence was allowed to grill her in open court about her sex life, and paint her as a harlot, implying or even openly arguing that she asked for it and/or deserved it. The notion of consent was weak, to say the least. Police where sexist AF and often laughed off reports, or went to investigate and told the suspect exactly who had reported them, opening them to retaliation. Women reported rape much less often, because there was almost no incentive for them to do so, and that’s exactly how society liked it. Naturally, this meant fewer accusations that couldn’t be proved, as well as outright fabrications. But also naturally, this meant many fewer guilty perpetrators were charged, much less convicted. If changes in the way rape is viewed, investigated, and prosecuted produces many more accusations, it is not necessarily a “problem” that there are more false accusations. If there are twice as many false accusations and simultaneously twice as many convictions, there is no problem at all, there is simply more reporting with exactly the same proportion of falsehood. If there are twice as many false reports and four times as many convictions, perhaps society is much better off. The fact is, false reports are sensational and get lots of attention. As they should, a false report is not only a crime, but a great injustice. We should work to discourage and disincent them. But not at the expense of discouraging all reports. And the side-effect of invading the privacy of those eho report rape is a return to the days when there were fewer false eports because women didn’t want to report rape at all.
  - Chazprime 8y ago
    And the side-effect of invading the privacy of those eho report rape is a return to the days when there were fewer false eports because women didn’t want to report rape at all. Regardless, it's not unreasonable to expect that in a legal matter all correspondence between two parties will be examined in order to determine what is just. We have to also be careful not to return to a time when an accusation alone is enough to determine guilt.
caprese 8y ago
what some say: "but victims will stop coming forward" (upvote, upvote, upvote) what others say: "but false accusations, indictments and convictions will also stop" (upvote, downvote, downvote) what some reply: "are you sure that is really a problem" (upvote upvote upvote) how frustrating, especially when nobody can reliable quantify anything or reliable prove anything
- bloak 8y ago
  And BBC journalists can't be bothered to explain even roughly what the current law is. Just copy-paste a few quotes, waffle a bit (don't forget to hit return twice after every full stop!) then move on to the next story.
  - caprese 8y ago
    When I was in another commonwealth country, Australia, I found that newspapers would often dance around uncomfortable issues to the point where you wouldn't even know what they are talking about. That was very odd to me. Who, what, why, when, where and how was just missing from articles like with Myanmar immigrants, or sexual assault solutions. This BBC article reminds me of that.
saagarjha 8y ago
> police and prosecutors say the forms are an attempt to plug a gap in the law which says complainants and witnesses cannot be forced to disclose relevant content from phones, laptops, tablets or smart watches This isn’t a “gap in the law” at all: it’s protection against incriminating yourself. It’s especially horrible that police are trying to push those involved in sexual assault trials to give up their liberties…
- JasonFruit 8y ago
  A thousand times this! I don't think anyone wants law with no gaps, if they could only be convinced to think about it before they beg the government to fix every problem for them.
- ryanm101 8y ago
  >This isn’t a “gap in the law” at all: it’s protection against incriminating yourself. So someones life should be ruined if you falsely accuse them simply because you shouldnt be allowed to incriminate yourself?
  - fabricexpert 8y ago
    Self incrimination is not the same as a false accusation. Imagine if the person raped committed a different crime, unrelated to the rape, for which there was evidence of that on their phone. In order to report the rape, they have to self incriminate themself for that crime as well? In this scenario any drug user, prostitute or other criminal has no protection from the law against being raped.
    - coherentpony 8y ago
      Or even more simply, even if there's no "other" crime: it's my personal data. I have a right to privacy.
      - deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
0898 8y ago
Alleged rape victims. [Edit] Why is this flagged? Pre-trial, they're an alleged victim – not a victim.
- tzs 8y ago
  I don't think that is correct, because the question before the court is not whether or not the person is a victim. The question is whether or not the accused committed the crime they are charged with. If the accused is convicted, we can infer that the accuser was indeed a victim. However, if the accused is acquitted, we cannot infer that the accuser was not a victim--we can only infer that if they were a victim, they were victimized by someone other than the accused. (There's also some fuzziness in here because of the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard from criminal cases). Your observation would only be correct in judicial systems in which an alleged victim has to undergo some sort of trial or hearing at which they must prove that a crime occurred against them before the system moves on to finding and trying someone for perpetrating that crime.
  - 0898 8y ago
    Okay, well reasoned. Perhaps “complainant” is more suitable than “victim” or “alleged victim”.
  - Udik 8y ago
    > However, if the accused is acquitted, we cannot infer that the accuser was not a victim--we can only infer that if they were a victim, they were victimized by someone other than the accused. Hm? I suppose that an overwhelming majority of rape allegations are made against one or more specific persons. If the accused are acquitted, the rape either didn't happen or cannot be proved because there are no witnesses and no evidence of it (which is in itself rather suspicious).
cheat_codes 8y ago
I think the police should just stay the fuck away from telephones.
NotPaidToPost 8y ago
> "We seem to be going back to the bad old days when victims of rape are being treated as suspects." It's tiring and in fact dangerous to see some groups continuously campaigning for women reporting rape to be blindly believed. Being accused of rape is devastating it is just that the police should start with a neutral stance and try to assert the plausibility of the accusation.
- usrusr 8y ago
  Weeding out the fakes should also be very much in the interest of actual victims.
- ryanm101 8y ago
  Absolutely, I agree. The presumption is innocent until proven guilty and the problem with sex crimes is even the accusation can completely destroy someones life regardless even if they are later found to have been innocent. In reality it is no different from ANY other crime in that there needs to be evidence that a crime has actually been committed.
0815test 8y ago
Clickbait. The prosecutors will only request the phones to be handed over when they're expected to contain evidence that's "relevant" to the case - possibly, evidence that might exonerate the defendant. Even in the U.S., prosecutors are in fact not allowed to withhold exculpatory evidence; it must be disclosed, according to the law.
roenxi 8y ago
Wikipedia suggests [0] at least 1 rape accusation in 50 is made baselessly and with malicious intent. Maybe a further 4 in 50 are likely to be mis-identified situations with no crime occurring. On the one hand, those numbers aren't high. On the other hand, these numbers are high enough that the police should be diligent exploring all available avenues of evidence. They should be tactful, discreet and empathetic as they do so. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_accusation_of_rape https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_accusation_of_rape
- repolfx 8y ago
  I wouldn't trust Wikipedia if I were you. There are various studies that look into this. Some of them work by examining police reports and looking at cases where the police concluded the woman was lying. These routinely give a figure as high as 50%. In interviews with individual policemen and policewomen, when asked to estimate the false reporting rate they also ballpark it at 50%. The 2% number is outright fraud. Try and find the original source for this figure and you won't be able to - others have tried. It gets repeated endlessly anyway because it suits the feminist cause to make false reports look extremely rare, but the 2% figure correlates with nothing. For instance the FBI's own figures show at minimum an 8% false reporting rate, which is much higher than for any other crime, and that's based on DNA tests alone. When the cases discarded by the police even before that are taken into account (e.g. because the woman admitted the next day she was drunk and hadn't really been raped, a surprisingly common occurrence) the rate climbs much further. See here for a writeup: https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/oct/7/false-sex-assault-reports-not-rare-reported-studie/ https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/oct/7/false-sex-as... Unfortunately what you see in this space is rampant manipulation of the figures. For instance it's common for a woman retracting her claim (i.e. saying she wasn't raped after all) to not be considered a false accusation, although there was an accusation, and the woman later decided her accusation should not stand. We can see a user in this thread stating that a woman admitting she lied is not sufficient evidence that the accusation was false - it's apparent that such people are desperate for the narrative to hold up, but what standard of proof would be sufficient for them? Of course in extremely rare cases someone might file a claim, and then retract it, whilst having been correct originally. But very often claims are retracted because the accuser realises an investigation will reveal that they're lying.
ryeights 8y ago
A gross invasion of privacy if I've ever seen one. A person's phone contains their most private thoughts, conversations, photos, etc. and victims are now expected to bare it all to police if they want a trial? What has the UK become? If the plaintiff's case is so weak that it could be discounted by a text message, then the jury should be ruling not guilty either way.
- throw_political 8y ago
  I think if you want to accuse someone of something as serious as rape then you should be prepared to back that up with access to all your data.
  - ilikehurdles 8y ago
    Why stop at rape accusations? Why not theft, or hit and runs? How about whenever you accuse anyone of any infraction, you have to hand over all your digital data to law enforcement? Oh I bet you’d never want to be subject to that, yet you want to make a special rule for one kind of accusation.
    - wtdata 8y ago
      Simply because none of those other accusations automatically destroy the accused reputation before they are deemed guilty by law.
    - bloak 8y ago
      One kind of accusation? Do you mean the kind of accusation in which the only evidence that a crime ever took place is the statement of a single witnesses? It doesn't seem unreasonable that you'd want to investigate the credibility of the witness in such cases. I certainly wouldn't stop at rape accusations. However, I think I'd prefer to see a court, rather than just the police, decide what data should be obtained/requested and how it should be used. I suspect that in some of these cases the police think it's a hopeless case and are looking for a justification for dropping it. They are perhaps thinking: if this person really wants us to prosecute, then, OK, we'll do it, even if it seems hopeless, but if they won't even fully cooperate by letting us examine their phone then we really can't be bothered any more because we've got lots of better cases to be working on.
ptah 8y ago
The case this stems from seems to have had problems due to historical Tory cuts to police budgets by Theresa May when police was her responsibility as shown in the Analysis section here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-42873618 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-42873618
- growlist 8y ago
  Don't try to pin this on the Tories - it was generally acknowledged to be the DPP's fault: https://www.theguardian.com/law/2018/jul/20/mps-criticise-dpp-alison-saunders-collapse-rape-trials https://www.theguardian.com/law/2018/jul/20/mps-criticise-dp...
DanBC 8y ago
For a Barrister's view: https://twitter.com/BarristerSecret/status/1122823927804227586 https://twitter.com/BarristerSecret/status/11228239278042275...
Funes- 8y ago
I really don't know what could make someone who has been the victim of such a heinous crime not hand over their phone if they are being honest in their accusations. Not having your phone for a month beats keeping your rapist unpunished in all cases, doesn't it? Maybe I'm missing something here, so I will welcome any comments that could shed some light on that. There may be cases that I'm not contemplating which could prove me wrong. P. S. An anecdote: one of my relatives is an attorney; he had a case which had been resolved as a false rape accusation just because they found evidence in the accuser's WhatsApp chats. It turns out she had been discussing with her mother how they would proceed to incriminate her alleged rapist so they could benefit economically from the trial. She wasn't prosecuted afterwards, which is the norm in my country.
- gus_massa 8y ago
  Self nude photos that can be leaked. Logged in accounts to a few sites. Ssh/pgp keys. A Bitcoin/Ethereum wallet without password. Secret drafts of midterms we will administer in the university. (I actually only have two of the four.)
- cwkoss 8y ago
  "Don't talk to the police" is a great lecture that explains why you should be extremely hesitant to volunteer ANY information to police. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE tl;dw - "Anything you say can and will be used against you"
dalbasal 8y ago
Would the entirety of the phone's contents become evidence that prosecution and defense can both look at to support their case? Also, if a victim/accuser refuses blanket consent, can they still make certain content available as evidence? Eg, text messages but not tinder or browsing history. These things are always minefields.
- DanBC 8y ago
  No. The defence can only ask for specific items that they think would support their case, they can't go fishing.
- torstenvl 8y ago
  I can't speak to the U.K., but in the U.S., the answer is: it depends. Typically, a search warrant will be limited in scope, whereas a consent search will not be. In fact, law enforcement is usually trained to ask for consent to search even if they have a warrant, because it precludes a lot of legal issues. For example, if they are executing a search and they see something out in the open that suggests some other crime but isn't conclusive, and they want to search for more evidence related to that other issue, they are supposed to seek another warrant unless an exception applies (e.g., exigent circumstances). If they have consent to search the house (or car, or ...), then they do not need to stop, and they do not need to worry about the evidence being excluded if the judge disagrees that there were exigent circumstances. For this reason, I think a lot of the reactions in this thread against compelled evidence are misplaced. A victim is much more likely to implicate herself or himself in collateral conduct in a consent search than they would be if the evidence were compelled. A search warrant, for example, would likely be limited to text messages between the alleged victim and the alleged perpetrator... and not include, e.g., text messages between the alleged victim and her/his drug dealer. Defense access will depend on discovery rules, which vary widely between jurisdictions. Either way, it won't be admissible in court unless a judge rules that it is relevant to the case.
Neil44 8y ago
What's prompted this is a couple of high profile cases recently where evidence from the complainant's phone has come up at the eleventh hour and exonerated the accused, wasting large amounts of taxpayer money and needlessly persecuting the innocent.
bentona 8y ago
Would the accused also be forced to hand over their phone? My initial impulse is that if we're going for equity, the same policy should be applied to both. I'm also assuming that there is an implicit accusation of false accusation by the originally accused.
- DanBC 8y ago
  If the accused says "it was fully consensual and I have messages on my phone that prove it" then yes, they would hand over their phone. This is the context in which the victim's phone would be searched. If the complainant said the phone was used during the rape to record the act then the phone would be seized as evidence. > I'm also assuming that there is an implicit accusation of false accusation by the originally accused. This is the difficult balancing act the police have to do: they have to treat complainants with respect and robustly investigate the alleged crime, but they have to hold open the (small) possibility that it didn't happen like the complainant says.
growlist 8y ago
'The woman who accused Allan said he had raped her multiple times over a 14-month period, and that she did not enjoy sex with him.' 'But the text messages show her directly contradicting these claims. In one message, she wrote “It wasn’t against my will or anything.” She also continually asked him for more sexual encounters and discussed rape fantasies.' Note: this woman's anonymity is still preserved, and she has apparently faced no punishment whatsoever. The UK seems to have a flexible attitude as to whether a false rape accusation should be considered a crime. https://thefederalist.com/2018/01/11/liam-allan-falsely-accused-rape-accuser-almost-got-away/ https://thefederalist.com/2018/01/11/liam-allan-falsely-accu...
- DanBC 8y ago
  > The UK seems to have a flexible attitude as to whether a false rape accusation should be considered a crime. This isn't true. False accusations of rape are more likely to be prosecuted than rape.
  - manfredo 8y ago
    Do we have a source for this claim - data on sexual violence is spotty, and data on false allegations of sexual violence is even spottier. The difference in estimated rates of false allegations often vary by 4-10x so I'm not sure how one can reliably make the claim that false allegations of rape are more likely to be protected.
    - DanBC 8y ago
      You're right that the stats are not very good, but that's because they significantly under-count incidences of rape. Rape cases can be complex, especially where the alleged rapist is also accused of domestic violence or coercive control, and this fear of violence from the alledged perpetrator or his family and friends leads some people to retract their allegation. Note that this does not mean they are false allegations, here's a woman who was prosecuted for falsely retracting a true allegation. > In November 2010, the Court of Appeal considered an appeal against sentence in the case of Ms A, who ultimately pleaded guilty to perverting the course of justice on the basis that she had falsely retracted true allegations of rape she had made against her husband. The annual crime survey (seen as reliable statistics) say that about 140,000 women and about 8,000 men are raped each year. There are about 6,000 prosecutions, and about 2.5k convictions. There are 35 prosecutions for false allegations of rape, out of about 90 cases that failed because the victim retracted their statement. https://www.cps.gov.uk/sites/default/files/documents/publications/perverting_course_of_justice_march_2013.pdf https://www.cps.gov.uk/sites/default/files/documents/publica... https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/datasets/sexualoffendingcrownprosecutionserviceappendixtables https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeand... The feeling that woman make very many false allegations of rape is not ture; the feeling that they go unpunished for this is not true. It's frankly disturbing that men seek to focus so much attention on this tiny number - fewer than 100 people per year - and not on the very much larger figure of over 8,000 men and 140,000 women who are victims of rape.
DanBC 8y ago
Here's the actual guidance from CPS: https://www.cps.gov.uk/cps/news/handing-over-mobile-phone-data-rape-prosecutions https://www.cps.gov.uk/cps/news/handing-over-mobile-phone-da...
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
multibit 8y ago
This won't help if a woman making a false accusation simply deletes the exonerating messages. If they used encrypted/ephemeral messaging, the phone/app company can't turn them over either. If the victim is lucky they'll still have their own copies.
DoreenMichele 8y ago
I'm disturbed by the increasing focus on the prosecution of rape. We need much more focus on rape prevention than what I'm seeing. I think the current adversarial climate just deepens the problem.
tracker1 7y ago
All I can say, is that when I was 19, I was falsely accused of rape. It was terrifying as a prospect even before fully knowing all the following results that would happen. First, you're in prison for a crime you didn't commit. Second, you're unable to get most jobs after prison because of the sentence. Third, you have to register for the rest of your life and deal with harassment or worse from vigilantist neighbors. Fourth, you aren't allowed to even live in a lot of places as a former felon and sex offender. If a false accuser goes far enough to actually see a trial and they're found to be lying, they absolutely should at the very least have to register on the sex offender registry as a potential risk to ANY future partners even if they don't see jail time when convicted. Edit: I've also been on the victim side of this... being falsely accused was far, far, far worse. Edit 2: The accuser doesn't have to turn over their phone... beyond that, I'd be fine to see an immunity from all but a specific list of felonies against any evidence found on the phone. I understand the risks against personal liberty and would prefer some protections... but it's too easy to get a false conviction. How many people every year are convicted under false accusations, and only accusation without evidence?

47 points by vesinisa 8y ago

This seems broadly in line (but less intrusive, and less protective of defendant's rights) with what has always been US practice in that no one is immune to being compelled to provide evidence except for very specific privileges. Not only can police/people ask for this information in the US (and the British use appears to be purely voluntary but with potential impacts on prosecution if it does not), but also either the prosecution or defense can issue subpoenas or secure court orders for evidence in the possession of victims or other parties.

55555 8y ago

'Fake' rape reports are a growing problem and the cases I have seen haven't resulted in any punishment for the accuser. I mean, obviously this isn't the best solution to the problem, but it's by far the easiest and cheapest for the taxpayer. It's evidence that would probably be required for the case in court anyway, right?

fabricexpert 8y ago
No- the prosecution does not have to search for and provide evidence that may exonerate the defense, that would be ridiculous.
- throw_political 8y ago
  > the prosecution does not have to search for and provide evidence that may exonerate the defense Nobody said the prosecution had to do anything. Where do you think you saw that? But the police are required to investigate. It has been the police who have been at fault, and censored rightly so, for not finding this evidence in these cases.
- JarlUlvi 8y ago
  In the US, the Law is clear - the Prosecution must expose exculpatory evidence to the Defense as a part of discovery.
- FakeComments 8y ago
  They don’t have to search for it, but they do have to provide any exonerating evidence they discover in the course of their investigation. That’s part of “discovery”, and cases have been thrown out because prosecutors concealed exculpatory evidence from the defense.
  - DanBC 8y ago
    It's what happened in the Liam Allen case which triggers this new guidance.
- hacknat 8y ago
  No, but the defense can and probably will subpoena these things. As a prosecutor you’d be dumb not to look at evidence you guess will come out at trial anyways.
- pdpi 8y ago
  We can argue about whether criminal law should focus on punishment or rehabilitation, but it should be completely evident that it's about punishing/rehabilitating the right person. Criminal prosecution isn't a game you're trying to win. If the investigation surfaces any evidence at all that the defendant might be innocent (or hints at the existence of said evidence), it's a gross miscarriage of justice not to bring this evidence forward.
- DanBC 8y ago
  In England: https://twitter.com/BarristerSecret/status/1122824178720055296 https://twitter.com/BarristerSecret/status/11228241787200552... > The prosecution is under a duty to pursue all reasonable lines of enquiry in an investigation, and to disclose to the defence any material it uncovers which may be reasonably capable of undermining the prosecution case or assisting the defence.
village-idiot 8y ago
Got any statistics on that being a growing problem?
- JarlUlvi 8y ago
  The statistics behind fake rape accusations are all over the roadmap. This is a good article on the subject https://www.vox.com/2015/6/1/8687479/lie-rape-statistics https://www.vox.com/2015/6/1/8687479/lie-rape-statistics
DanBC 8y ago
In the UK they're not a growing problem, they're very rare, and the police rigorously prosecute them. https://www.buzzfeed.com/katiejmbaker/vulnerable-women-routinely-jailed-false-rape https://www.buzzfeed.com/katiejmbaker/vulnerable-women-routi...
- chmod775 8y ago
  That article gives me the chills, treating false rape allegations as if it was some trivial "no harm done" kind of thing. It's a serious matter. It's up there with allegations of murder, except that people who are cleared of murder generally face less prejudice and discrimination than people cleared of rape. Intentionally making false allegations should carry a sentence proportionate to the alleged crime, not to mention compensation for harm done to the reputation of the accused. Most of these people got off easy. The article also glosses over the fact that most of them were found guilty by a jury, whereas if the alleged rapists would've been found guilty, nobody would've spared them a second thought or cried foul.
  - DanBC 8y ago
    Except in most of these cases the allegations aren't false, and harm was done. The harm isn't being done to the abusive men, but to the vulnerable women. And, in the context of rape, false allegations are vanishinly rare. In the UK commonly accepted figures say there are 90,000 rapes each year (and the real number is likely to be higher). That's a huge number of people who aren't seeing justice.
    - chmod775 8y ago
      > Except in most of these cases the allegations aren't false, and harm was done. The harm isn't being done to the abusive men, but to the vulnerable women. There was not only no evidence of any crime committed by the accused, there was evidence of the accusers lying. A jury, after being presented evidence by both sides, first found the accused not guilty. Later, a different jury, after being presented evidence by two sides, found the accusers guilty of lying. What makes you so confident that, after reading an article that is objectively one-sided, you have a better grasp of the situation than the jurors in question? This absolutely boggles my mind. Maybe they all have been found not guilty by another jury by now and I just glossed over that fact?
theon144 8y ago
>I mean, obviously this isn't the best solution to the problem, but it's by far the easiest and cheapest for the taxpayer. If your "easiest and cheapest" solution involves the violation of liberties, let alone people in vulnerable positions such as rape victims, you might wish to rethink it. > It's evidence that would probably be required for the case in court anyway, right? If you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear, right? I genuinely don't understand how this is still a valid argument in the minds of some people. Yes, it might probably be required, but the law was written like this for a reason. You're further disincentivizing rape victims from reporting the crime, which already is a huge issue due to stigmatization and the psychological trauma. --- And as others have mentioned, I would like to see a source on "'Fake' rape reports being a growing problem", that would warrant this kind of response.
- throw_political 8y ago
  'Alleged victims' you mean, right? Whoops.
braythwayt 8y ago
Let’s flip this over. In the case of a woman who is murdered and who has a male partner, it is nearly ALWAYS the partner. It isn’t a growing problem, it has been with us forever. Now obviously, the easiest and cheapest thing for the taxpayer would be to simply lock up the partner when a woman with a partner is murdered. That would be unjust, even if it is nearly always right and easiest and cheapest. Ok, but MRA folks would go ballistic, so let’s make it easier: If a woman with a male partner is murdered, we simply require the male partner to give up their cell phone’s contents. No silly paperwork for a warrant, no laws about self-incrimination or any of that, we just cite the “Taxpayer’s Efficiency Act of 2019” and they have to hand it over, or sit in jail for contempt until they do. Is that still unjust? It is, isn’t it? I put it to you that if false accusations of rape, which happen rarely, justify examining phones belonging to the victims, then murder of a woman by her male partner, who is usually the perpetrator, justifies the exact same thing. What stops us in both cases is the notion of justice. It is unjust whether the person is likely or unlikely to b a law-breaker. And we as a society have decided that justice is a greater good than saving a few bucks or making things easier for police.
- 5trokerac3 8y ago
  There's a huge difference between incarcerating someone and getting a warrant for their phone records. Your analogy is made less relevant by the fact that if a woman is murdered they very likely would get a warrant for her partner's phone records. Where the 4th amendment applies here is if any evidence of a different crime were found while looking for information on the first. If the phone records were acquired by a warrant, that evidence would not be admissible in court.
  - braythwayt 8y ago
    Not at all, you said the magic word: “Warrant.” A warrant involves judicial oversight. Warrantless searches do not.
    - 5trokerac3 8y ago
      It is your responsibility to protect your 4A rights. This is why you never let the police in your house without a warrant. Inviting them in allows them to search and charge you based on anything they find. Step outside and talk to them if they want to interview you, and password protect your phone and demand they get a warrant if they want to look at it.
braythwayt 8y ago
I want to respond separately to the notion of fake reports being a “growing problem.” You haven’t cited any evidence, so I don’t know is this is true or if you are just repeating something somebody said on the internet. But if there was some evidence along these lines, my first question would be whether rape reports are growing. One thing that used to happen was that there was an enormous amount of disincentive to report rape. Society assumed by default that the woman was “asking for it.” The defence was allowed to grill her in open court about her sex life, and paint her as a harlot, implying or even openly arguing that she asked for it and/or deserved it. The notion of consent was weak, to say the least. Police where sexist AF and often laughed off reports, or went to investigate and told the suspect exactly who had reported them, opening them to retaliation. Women reported rape much less often, because there was almost no incentive for them to do so, and that’s exactly how society liked it. Naturally, this meant fewer accusations that couldn’t be proved, as well as outright fabrications. But also naturally, this meant many fewer guilty perpetrators were charged, much less convicted. If changes in the way rape is viewed, investigated, and prosecuted produces many more accusations, it is not necessarily a “problem” that there are more false accusations. If there are twice as many false accusations and simultaneously twice as many convictions, there is no problem at all, there is simply more reporting with exactly the same proportion of falsehood. If there are twice as many false reports and four times as many convictions, perhaps society is much better off. The fact is, false reports are sensational and get lots of attention. As they should, a false report is not only a crime, but a great injustice. We should work to discourage and disincent them. But not at the expense of discouraging all reports. And the side-effect of invading the privacy of those eho report rape is a return to the days when there were fewer false eports because women didn’t want to report rape at all.
- Chazprime 8y ago
  And the side-effect of invading the privacy of those eho report rape is a return to the days when there were fewer false eports because women didn’t want to report rape at all. Regardless, it's not unreasonable to expect that in a legal matter all correspondence between two parties will be examined in order to determine what is just. We have to also be careful not to return to a time when an accusation alone is enough to determine guilt.

caprese 8y ago

what some say: "but victims will stop coming forward" (upvote, upvote, upvote) what others say: "but false accusations, indictments and convictions will also stop" (upvote, downvote, downvote) what some reply: "are you sure that is really a problem" (upvote upvote upvote) how frustrating, especially when nobody can reliable quantify anything or reliable prove anything

bloak 8y ago
And BBC journalists can't be bothered to explain even roughly what the current law is. Just copy-paste a few quotes, waffle a bit (don't forget to hit return twice after every full stop!) then move on to the next story.
- caprese 8y ago
  When I was in another commonwealth country, Australia, I found that newspapers would often dance around uncomfortable issues to the point where you wouldn't even know what they are talking about. That was very odd to me. Who, what, why, when, where and how was just missing from articles like with Myanmar immigrants, or sexual assault solutions. This BBC article reminds me of that.

saagarjha 8y ago

> police and prosecutors say the forms are an attempt to plug a gap in the law which says complainants and witnesses cannot be forced to disclose relevant content from phones, laptops, tablets or smart watches This isn’t a “gap in the law” at all: it’s protection against incriminating yourself. It’s especially horrible that police are trying to push those involved in sexual assault trials to give up their liberties…

JasonFruit 8y ago
A thousand times this! I don't think anyone wants law with no gaps, if they could only be convinced to think about it before they beg the government to fix every problem for them.
ryanm101 8y ago
>This isn’t a “gap in the law” at all: it’s protection against incriminating yourself. So someones life should be ruined if you falsely accuse them simply because you shouldnt be allowed to incriminate yourself?
- fabricexpert 8y ago
  Self incrimination is not the same as a false accusation. Imagine if the person raped committed a different crime, unrelated to the rape, for which there was evidence of that on their phone. In order to report the rape, they have to self incriminate themself for that crime as well? In this scenario any drug user, prostitute or other criminal has no protection from the law against being raped.
  - coherentpony 8y ago
    Or even more simply, even if there's no "other" crime: it's my personal data. I have a right to privacy.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]

0898 8y ago

Alleged rape victims. [Edit] Why is this flagged? Pre-trial, they're an alleged victim – not a victim.

tzs 8y ago
I don't think that is correct, because the question before the court is not whether or not the person is a victim. The question is whether or not the accused committed the crime they are charged with. If the accused is convicted, we can infer that the accuser was indeed a victim. However, if the accused is acquitted, we cannot infer that the accuser was not a victim--we can only infer that if they were a victim, they were victimized by someone other than the accused. (There's also some fuzziness in here because of the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard from criminal cases). Your observation would only be correct in judicial systems in which an alleged victim has to undergo some sort of trial or hearing at which they must prove that a crime occurred against them before the system moves on to finding and trying someone for perpetrating that crime.
- 0898 8y ago
  Okay, well reasoned. Perhaps “complainant” is more suitable than “victim” or “alleged victim”.
- Udik 8y ago
  > However, if the accused is acquitted, we cannot infer that the accuser was not a victim--we can only infer that if they were a victim, they were victimized by someone other than the accused. Hm? I suppose that an overwhelming majority of rape allegations are made against one or more specific persons. If the accused are acquitted, the rape either didn't happen or cannot be proved because there are no witnesses and no evidence of it (which is in itself rather suspicious).

cheat_codes 8y ago

I think the police should just stay the fuck away from telephones.

NotPaidToPost 8y ago

> "We seem to be going back to the bad old days when victims of rape are being treated as suspects." It's tiring and in fact dangerous to see some groups continuously campaigning for women reporting rape to be blindly believed. Being accused of rape is devastating it is just that the police should start with a neutral stance and try to assert the plausibility of the accusation.

usrusr 8y ago
Weeding out the fakes should also be very much in the interest of actual victims.
ryanm101 8y ago
Absolutely, I agree. The presumption is innocent until proven guilty and the problem with sex crimes is even the accusation can completely destroy someones life regardless even if they are later found to have been innocent. In reality it is no different from ANY other crime in that there needs to be evidence that a crime has actually been committed.

0815test 8y ago

Clickbait. The prosecutors will only request the phones to be handed over when they're expected to contain evidence that's "relevant" to the case - possibly, evidence that might exonerate the defendant. Even in the U.S., prosecutors are in fact not allowed to withhold exculpatory evidence; it must be disclosed, according to the law.

roenxi 8y ago

Wikipedia suggests [0] at least 1 rape accusation in 50 is made baselessly and with malicious intent. Maybe a further 4 in 50 are likely to be mis-identified situations with no crime occurring. On the one hand, those numbers aren't high. On the other hand, these numbers are high enough that the police should be diligent exploring all available avenues of evidence. They should be tactful, discreet and empathetic as they do so. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_accusation_of_rape https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_accusation_of_rape

repolfx 8y ago
I wouldn't trust Wikipedia if I were you. There are various studies that look into this. Some of them work by examining police reports and looking at cases where the police concluded the woman was lying. These routinely give a figure as high as 50%. In interviews with individual policemen and policewomen, when asked to estimate the false reporting rate they also ballpark it at 50%. The 2% number is outright fraud. Try and find the original source for this figure and you won't be able to - others have tried. It gets repeated endlessly anyway because it suits the feminist cause to make false reports look extremely rare, but the 2% figure correlates with nothing. For instance the FBI's own figures show at minimum an 8% false reporting rate, which is much higher than for any other crime, and that's based on DNA tests alone. When the cases discarded by the police even before that are taken into account (e.g. because the woman admitted the next day she was drunk and hadn't really been raped, a surprisingly common occurrence) the rate climbs much further. See here for a writeup: https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/oct/7/false-sex-assault-reports-not-rare-reported-studie/ https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/oct/7/false-sex-as... Unfortunately what you see in this space is rampant manipulation of the figures. For instance it's common for a woman retracting her claim (i.e. saying she wasn't raped after all) to not be considered a false accusation, although there was an accusation, and the woman later decided her accusation should not stand. We can see a user in this thread stating that a woman admitting she lied is not sufficient evidence that the accusation was false - it's apparent that such people are desperate for the narrative to hold up, but what standard of proof would be sufficient for them? Of course in extremely rare cases someone might file a claim, and then retract it, whilst having been correct originally. But very often claims are retracted because the accuser realises an investigation will reveal that they're lying.

ryeights 8y ago

A gross invasion of privacy if I've ever seen one. A person's phone contains their most private thoughts, conversations, photos, etc. and victims are now expected to bare it all to police if they want a trial? What has the UK become? If the plaintiff's case is so weak that it could be discounted by a text message, then the jury should be ruling not guilty either way.

throw_political 8y ago
I think if you want to accuse someone of something as serious as rape then you should be prepared to back that up with access to all your data.
- ilikehurdles 8y ago
  Why stop at rape accusations? Why not theft, or hit and runs? How about whenever you accuse anyone of any infraction, you have to hand over all your digital data to law enforcement? Oh I bet you’d never want to be subject to that, yet you want to make a special rule for one kind of accusation.
  - wtdata 8y ago
    Simply because none of those other accusations automatically destroy the accused reputation before they are deemed guilty by law.
  - bloak 8y ago
    One kind of accusation? Do you mean the kind of accusation in which the only evidence that a crime ever took place is the statement of a single witnesses? It doesn't seem unreasonable that you'd want to investigate the credibility of the witness in such cases. I certainly wouldn't stop at rape accusations. However, I think I'd prefer to see a court, rather than just the police, decide what data should be obtained/requested and how it should be used. I suspect that in some of these cases the police think it's a hopeless case and are looking for a justification for dropping it. They are perhaps thinking: if this person really wants us to prosecute, then, OK, we'll do it, even if it seems hopeless, but if they won't even fully cooperate by letting us examine their phone then we really can't be bothered any more because we've got lots of better cases to be working on.

ptah 8y ago

The case this stems from seems to have had problems due to historical Tory cuts to police budgets by Theresa May when police was her responsibility as shown in the Analysis section here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-42873618 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-42873618

growlist 8y ago
Don't try to pin this on the Tories - it was generally acknowledged to be the DPP's fault: https://www.theguardian.com/law/2018/jul/20/mps-criticise-dpp-alison-saunders-collapse-rape-trials https://www.theguardian.com/law/2018/jul/20/mps-criticise-dp...

DanBC 8y ago

For a Barrister's view: https://twitter.com/BarristerSecret/status/1122823927804227586 https://twitter.com/BarristerSecret/status/11228239278042275...

Funes- 8y ago

I really don't know what could make someone who has been the victim of such a heinous crime not hand over their phone if they are being honest in their accusations. Not having your phone for a month beats keeping your rapist unpunished in all cases, doesn't it? Maybe I'm missing something here, so I will welcome any comments that could shed some light on that. There may be cases that I'm not contemplating which could prove me wrong. P. S. An anecdote: one of my relatives is an attorney; he had a case which had been resolved as a false rape accusation just because they found evidence in the accuser's WhatsApp chats. It turns out she had been discussing with her mother how they would proceed to incriminate her alleged rapist so they could benefit economically from the trial. She wasn't prosecuted afterwards, which is the norm in my country.

gus_massa 8y ago
Self nude photos that can be leaked. Logged in accounts to a few sites. Ssh/pgp keys. A Bitcoin/Ethereum wallet without password. Secret drafts of midterms we will administer in the university. (I actually only have two of the four.)
cwkoss 8y ago
"Don't talk to the police" is a great lecture that explains why you should be extremely hesitant to volunteer ANY information to police. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE tl;dw - "Anything you say can and will be used against you"

dalbasal 8y ago

Would the entirety of the phone's contents become evidence that prosecution and defense can both look at to support their case? Also, if a victim/accuser refuses blanket consent, can they still make certain content available as evidence? Eg, text messages but not tinder or browsing history. These things are always minefields.

DanBC 8y ago
No. The defence can only ask for specific items that they think would support their case, they can't go fishing.
torstenvl 8y ago
I can't speak to the U.K., but in the U.S., the answer is: it depends. Typically, a search warrant will be limited in scope, whereas a consent search will not be. In fact, law enforcement is usually trained to ask for consent to search even if they have a warrant, because it precludes a lot of legal issues. For example, if they are executing a search and they see something out in the open that suggests some other crime but isn't conclusive, and they want to search for more evidence related to that other issue, they are supposed to seek another warrant unless an exception applies (e.g., exigent circumstances). If they have consent to search the house (or car, or ...), then they do not need to stop, and they do not need to worry about the evidence being excluded if the judge disagrees that there were exigent circumstances. For this reason, I think a lot of the reactions in this thread against compelled evidence are misplaced. A victim is much more likely to implicate herself or himself in collateral conduct in a consent search than they would be if the evidence were compelled. A search warrant, for example, would likely be limited to text messages between the alleged victim and the alleged perpetrator... and not include, e.g., text messages between the alleged victim and her/his drug dealer. Defense access will depend on discovery rules, which vary widely between jurisdictions. Either way, it won't be admissible in court unless a judge rules that it is relevant to the case.

Neil44 8y ago

What's prompted this is a couple of high profile cases recently where evidence from the complainant's phone has come up at the eleventh hour and exonerated the accused, wasting large amounts of taxpayer money and needlessly persecuting the innocent.

bentona 8y ago

Would the accused also be forced to hand over their phone? My initial impulse is that if we're going for equity, the same policy should be applied to both. I'm also assuming that there is an implicit accusation of false accusation by the originally accused.

DanBC 8y ago
If the accused says "it was fully consensual and I have messages on my phone that prove it" then yes, they would hand over their phone. This is the context in which the victim's phone would be searched. If the complainant said the phone was used during the rape to record the act then the phone would be seized as evidence. > I'm also assuming that there is an implicit accusation of false accusation by the originally accused. This is the difficult balancing act the police have to do: they have to treat complainants with respect and robustly investigate the alleged crime, but they have to hold open the (small) possibility that it didn't happen like the complainant says.

growlist 8y ago

'The woman who accused Allan said he had raped her multiple times over a 14-month period, and that she did not enjoy sex with him.' 'But the text messages show her directly contradicting these claims. In one message, she wrote “It wasn’t against my will or anything.” She also continually asked him for more sexual encounters and discussed rape fantasies.' Note: this woman's anonymity is still preserved, and she has apparently faced no punishment whatsoever. The UK seems to have a flexible attitude as to whether a false rape accusation should be considered a crime. https://thefederalist.com/2018/01/11/liam-allan-falsely-accused-rape-accuser-almost-got-away/ https://thefederalist.com/2018/01/11/liam-allan-falsely-accu...

DanBC 8y ago
> The UK seems to have a flexible attitude as to whether a false rape accusation should be considered a crime. This isn't true. False accusations of rape are more likely to be prosecuted than rape.
- manfredo 8y ago
  Do we have a source for this claim - data on sexual violence is spotty, and data on false allegations of sexual violence is even spottier. The difference in estimated rates of false allegations often vary by 4-10x so I'm not sure how one can reliably make the claim that false allegations of rape are more likely to be protected.
  - DanBC 8y ago
    You're right that the stats are not very good, but that's because they significantly under-count incidences of rape. Rape cases can be complex, especially where the alleged rapist is also accused of domestic violence or coercive control, and this fear of violence from the alledged perpetrator or his family and friends leads some people to retract their allegation. Note that this does not mean they are false allegations, here's a woman who was prosecuted for falsely retracting a true allegation. > In November 2010, the Court of Appeal considered an appeal against sentence in the case of Ms A, who ultimately pleaded guilty to perverting the course of justice on the basis that she had falsely retracted true allegations of rape she had made against her husband. The annual crime survey (seen as reliable statistics) say that about 140,000 women and about 8,000 men are raped each year. There are about 6,000 prosecutions, and about 2.5k convictions. There are 35 prosecutions for false allegations of rape, out of about 90 cases that failed because the victim retracted their statement. https://www.cps.gov.uk/sites/default/files/documents/publications/perverting_course_of_justice_march_2013.pdf https://www.cps.gov.uk/sites/default/files/documents/publica... https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/datasets/sexualoffendingcrownprosecutionserviceappendixtables https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeand... The feeling that woman make very many false allegations of rape is not ture; the feeling that they go unpunished for this is not true. It's frankly disturbing that men seek to focus so much attention on this tiny number - fewer than 100 people per year - and not on the very much larger figure of over 8,000 men and 140,000 women who are victims of rape.

DanBC 8y ago

Here's the actual guidance from CPS: https://www.cps.gov.uk/cps/news/handing-over-mobile-phone-data-rape-prosecutions https://www.cps.gov.uk/cps/news/handing-over-mobile-phone-da...

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

multibit 8y ago

This won't help if a woman making a false accusation simply deletes the exonerating messages. If they used encrypted/ephemeral messaging, the phone/app company can't turn them over either. If the victim is lucky they'll still have their own copies.

DoreenMichele 8y ago

I'm disturbed by the increasing focus on the prosecution of rape. We need much more focus on rape prevention than what I'm seeing. I think the current adversarial climate just deepens the problem.

tracker1 7y ago

All I can say, is that when I was 19, I was falsely accused of rape. It was terrifying as a prospect even before fully knowing all the following results that would happen. First, you're in prison for a crime you didn't commit. Second, you're unable to get most jobs after prison because of the sentence. Third, you have to register for the rest of your life and deal with harassment or worse from vigilantist neighbors. Fourth, you aren't allowed to even live in a lot of places as a former felon and sex offender. If a false accuser goes far enough to actually see a trial and they're found to be lying, they absolutely should at the very least have to register on the sex offender registry as a potential risk to ANY future partners even if they don't see jail time when convicted. Edit: I've also been on the victim side of this... being falsely accused was far, far, far worse. Edit 2: The accuser doesn't have to turn over their phone... beyond that, I'd be fine to see an immunity from all but a specific list of felonies against any evidence found on the phone. I understand the risks against personal liberty and would prefer some protections... but it's too easy to get a false conviction. How many people every year are convicted under false accusations, and only accusation without evidence?