Rape

This article examines whether crimes motivated by, or which demonstrate, gender ‘hostility’ should be included within the current framework of hate crime legislation in England and Wales. The article uses the example of rape to explore the parallels which exist (both conceptually and evidentially) between gender-motivated violence and other types of hate crime. It is argued that where clear evidence of gender hostility exists, defendants should be pursued in law additionally as hate crime offenders. While various practical, and to a lesser extent conceptual, problems persist – including difficulties in proving gender-based hostility, the issue of multiple and intersecting prejudices, and the potential for overwhelming the hate crime policy domain – the article asserts that the inclusion of gender within hate crime law will serve as a valuable tool in combating gendered violence. In particular, it is argued that by focusing on the hate-motivation of many offenders of sexual violence, the criminal justice system can move away from its current focus on the ‘sexual’ motivations of offenders and begin to more effectively challenge the gendered prejudices that are frequently causal to such crimes. These are prejudices which have also given rise to invidious stereotypes about women and myths about rape victims that have historically inhibited the successful prosecution of offenders.

This article explores the discursive afterlife of the 1822 murder of Marie Gérin by the Abbé Mingrat, who subsequently fled France and was never extradited. The crime, which the Restoration government attempted to conceal, is read here as a cause célèbre that acted throughout the Restoration as a watchword of anticlerical and otherwise oppositional opinion. The article examines pamphlets published by Marie’s relatives and by Paul-Louis Courier, on the one hand, and on the other, official papers relating to the persecution of Marie’s brother for his attempts to publicize the crime. It takes these texts as symptomatic of a broader early nineteenth-century dispute: a cultural and moral disagreement about the meaning of scandal, which might be imagined ‘conservatively’, as a pathogenic spectacle that spreads corruption; or, as it was by the pamphleteers, ‘progressively’, as a therapeutic revelation that brings that corruption to an end. It also contributes to our understanding of the modes of political participation available to those excluded from the Restoration political process.

Rape is a difficult subject to research ethically and there are many methodological conundrums when collecting and interpreting data. Previously a number of techniques have been employed, for example: vignettes, trial observations and case tracking. This paper will focus on the use of police data for empirical investigations of rape. Initially consideration will be given to the difficulties in gaining access and ensuring ethical concerns and matters of confidentiality and anonymity are adequately addressed. The paper will then address the advantages and disadvantages of using such a dataset including accuracy,
missing data and using data. The paper also includes the initial findings of a study using police data to investigate rapes where the victim was under the influence of alcohol or drugs when the rape occurred.

In 1977 a poll of opinions on rape was commissioned by the Daily Mail, partly in response to a rape case which was widely reported in the press at the time because of a particularly lenient sentence.1 The poll asked respondents about which offence types they saw as most serious, whether they thought these offences had increased, whether they personally knew someone who had been raped, whether they agreed or disagreed with a range of statements about rape victims and offenders, what factors they thought should be and actually were taken into consideration when considering punishment for those found guilty of rape, and how women should react if they were raped.The results of this poll were reported in the Daily Mail on 1 July 1977.

In 2009, we were appointed as a team of academics to conduct a rapid evidence assessment to inform the Government’s Stern Review on rape (Brown et al., 2010). One of the questions we were asked was whether there was any evidence of attitudinal changes to rape over time.This was difficult to answer with the available evidence, since surveys asked different questions and used different populations.Therefore, in February 2010 the 1977 survey was re-run and a comparative analysis conducted.This report provides an overview of the key findings.

Rape remains one of the most controversial issues within criminal justice and receives high profile coverage internationally. Despite the many changes there have been to the law, practice and procedure in the investigation of rape allegations, and support available for victims, victims are routinely blamed for their victimization. Only a very small number of perpetrators ever face prosecution, let alone conviction.

This book aims to take stock of current thinking and research about rape and the way it is handled in practice within the criminal justice system, and to challenge some of the widely held but inaccurate beliefs about rape. It brings together leading researchers in the field from psychology, sociology and law, considering new research and presenting new data from a strong theoretical and contextual base.

The main focus of the book is on adult victims of rape, with chapters exploring such issues as rape and the media, the use of alcohol and drugs in rape, police decision making on rape cases, conviction patterns in rape trials, and interviewing victims of rape and sexual assault.