There is some consternation in the Seattle PI over the fact that an accused rapist is allowed to question his accuser while representing himself in trial. A number of women apparently find this outrageous, because they hold that rape has a metaphysical effect on the alleged victim that goes beyond any other crime. The alleged victim may be further psychologically wounded by having to testify — far more so than someone who was merely shot, stabbed or, say, assaulted with a chainsaw.
If the article is accurate, Skanda, the accused rapist, is a pretty scummy guy who tried to found an ecstasy-popping “love church” and has suggested that the alleged victim’s husband is a child molester. Skanda is saying that he didn’t rape the woman, but only became involved in an affair with her, after which he claims she contracted him to kill her husband. Sounds like a swell guy… If Skanda is found guilty beyond reasonable doubt, then I would say that the woman has done us all a favor by taking the stand and putting him away.
However, it would be a huge mistake to allow repulsive defendants to become a justification for the removal of constitutional rights. Unfortunately that’s what has happened. So-called “rape shield” laws limit cross-examination of the accuser, and in most jurisdictions prohibit questioning past sexual conduct, including prior false allegations of rape. The reasoning behind these laws is that it is a “double victimization” when an alleged victim must take the stand against the accused, and that women would be unable to testify or afraid to press charges if they knew they’d be asked difficult questions in court.
As nasty as it may seem to American sentiments to pose hard questions to an alleged rape victim, the grim fate of falsely convicted men is far worse than a few days of traumatic testimony. I recently discovered the “Innocence Project” online, and while browsing through the profiles of falsely convicted men, noticed that the vast majority were convicted of rape (in fairness, I should say men and women — out of the several hundred falsely convicted there were four women who had been convicted as accessories to murder). In case after case men were going down for rapes that they had nothing to do with, and almost all of the men profiled on the Innocence Project were ultimately exonerated by DNA evidence that had been saved. If there had been no DNA evidence left over, or none collected in the first place, these men would still be in prison, and they’d be just as innocent. That most cases do not involve DNA evidence is a very sobering fact, and suggests that there are probably thousands of innocent men in prison even as you read these words.
In most of the false convictions, it appears that witnesses misidentified the suspects, and in quite a few police extracted false confessions. Shoddy lab work – including sheer fabrication – also plays a large role, and of course you have the overworked, incompetent or indisposed public defenders. It appears that these men were essentially convicted before they even went before a jury, and their defense was clearly inadequate. So why, then, if so many men are falsely convicted of rape, are rape trials subject to special rules to shield the accuser? Could these laws be putting innocent men in prison?
5 responses so far ↓
1 Puma // Jun 25, 2009 at 10:15 am
metaphysical effect on the alleged victim that goes beyond any other crime
You mean like Paternity Fraud? When the victim is the one who is enslaved. When the victim dies a genetic metadeath because he has lost the window to sire his own children, and is stripped of the means/assets to sire his own during his remaining years on Earth?
2 Lukobe // Jun 25, 2009 at 12:56 pm
Could be. It’s a good argument for the abolition, or at the very least, extremely severe restriction, of the death penalty, anyway.
3 miles // Jun 25, 2009 at 7:21 pm
Welmer wrote:
“and suggests that there are probably thousands of innocent men in prison even as you read these words”
Yes, this is certainly the case. Paul Craig Roberts has written about this several times. “TestiLYING” is practically a cornerstone of some cops in law enforcement. If you want the truth, hardly anybody in any juristiction has more real *power* than your local district attorney if he/she really gets on your case. If it were not for DNA, Mike Nifong would be the reason several white boys from Duke would be in jail being raped daily right now, just because he could.
DNA evidence should be practically NECESSARY for a rape conviction. You are going to leave some evidence (saliva, pubic hairs, body hairs, head hairs, fingerprints, noseprints—yes there is such a thing as noseprints, and who knows what else behind after a rape.
When you think about it……………..something really is amiss in our nation when one considers the incarceration rate. Its crazy to have this many people behind bars. Either we have cultivated some rather irresponsible people (we certainly have) or we are feeding a prison business (also true), but there is something beyond that. My opinion is that there isn’t enough decent paying work for lower-IQ’ed males because so much of it has been shipped away, that despair, addiction, overshowing of masculinity is a way many of them express their discontent with their circumstances.
4 Welmer // Jun 25, 2009 at 7:33 pm
That is a very good point. The American economy has been distorted in a way that deprives many ordinary men of an opportunity to contribute anything at all, even though they do have the ability and desire to do so.
I’d like to address this problem, because it is crucial to economic justice — a concept that has been thoroughly abused and twisted to justify depriving men of the ability to make a living.
5 Jeff // Jun 26, 2009 at 11:55 am
There are many differences in a woman being raped and being emotionally scarred and a person that is a victim of paternity fraud. Being raped is more physically traumatic, where as in paternity fraud you are scared more emotionally by the fact of the woman’s deception, the child that you thought was once yours and is not and are constantly reminded of it every time someone asks you about children and every month you write a check to this person that has irreparably hurt you. It changes the way you think of woman, our legal system, the state and federal government, senators, representative, every time you see a man and woman walking around with a child you think is that child really his, you become a second class citizens that society allows your constitutional rights to be violated, it is difficult to trust anyone. Every time you try to fight back the system constantly suppressed you and continues to victimize you as though you are the guilty one, you should have known better then to trust this person. In reality it is worse than rape as far as being a victim, because at least if you are a rape victim you get some sort of restitution for the perpetrator being prosecuted, were as if you are a paternity fraud victim you get just the opposite in which you continue to pay the perpetrator. You make decisions such as getting a vasectomy, because you have been deceived into believing you have a child while the perpetrator knowing lets it happen and sits by and says nothing. For the life of me I cannot understand how any system does not understand how cruel it is to have a person commit paternity fraud on you. This is cruel and inhumane just as rape and it and should not be treated any differently. It tears your heart out, rips at your stomach, destroys your focus, hurts you inside, changes how you see things, taints you views, tears at your trust, makes it difficult to have another relationship, depresses you. Without a doubt rape and paternity fraud are disgustingly outrageous act that should not be tolerated in any civilized society. The perpetrators in either one of these situations prey on their victims, with the significant difference being that a rapist is punished by law and society and the female perpetrator of paternity fraud is rewarded. It is beyond my comprehension that this is really happening and I wish it were all just a dream and would wake up and this really was not happening. This does not even begin to describe the child that has been victimized by this heinous crime and the best thing that our government can do is make the other victim pay the perpetrator and label them as an unwanted visitor (visitation), because of the wake of destruction that the perpetrator has created. I could write a book on the effects of paternity fraud, but I will stop here in hope that the readers will read this small response.
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