IT IS IMPORTANT to remind ourselves what the research on rape and sexual assault has established. This should prevent the myths about rape gaining a renewed purchase in public debate and a dominance in public consciousness.

The most pernicious one is that a high proportion of rape allegations are false. The reality is in marked contrast.

Data from a survey of 28 European countries, including Ireland, showed the overall rate of false allegations is less than 9% of all reports. The common factor in the “false” cases was that complainant had consumed significant amounts of alcohol at the time of the alleged assault.

Consistency and significance

Then there is the issue of consistency. It is not unusual for the testimony of rape victims to be the key evidence in rape trials. Equally it is not unusual for it to be inconsistent. Sexual assaults are traumatic events. As such they damage rather than heighten memory, so incoherencies in the victims’ accounts are inescapable.

This is an issue of some significance. If victim accounts do not conform to what justice personnel regard as “credible evidence” then they may not pursue the cases. And if they do, victims come under intensive cross-examination over the detail of their accounts.

This, they experience, as oppressive, traumatic and unfair, and as an additional layer of victimisation.

Role of alcohol

The other factor that damages victim credibility is the role of alcohol. It is a strikingly noteworthy factor in rape cases in Ireland. The EU research found that vast majority of suspects and complainants in Irish cases had been drinking heavily around the time of the assault.

By contrast in most European countries about a third of complainants had consumed alcohol prior to the assault. In Ireland, over 80% of complainants had. This was the highest in the European study.

The courts are very clear that intoxication is neither an excuse for nor a defence for rape. The problem may well be that the court of public opinion as represented by jurors could have a different view.

However the overall problems in the criminal justice response are those of underreporting and attrition. The non-reporting of victims remains frustratingly high at around 70% of incidents. The decisions of victims to drop the case and the decision of the prosecution service not to pursue them are the other two.

Solutions

But while the problems are clear the solutions are less so. What have been termed “victim centric” measures often raise the expectations of victims of what the court case will produce, thus leaving them unprepared for the realities of the courtroom experience.

In England  and Wales an officially encouraged attempt to increase the number of cases being taken to court seems to have produced an increased rate of “not guilty” verdicts as many of the cases collapse as victims are not believed by the courts. When it doesn’t work out it increases their sense of being revictimised.

In many ways these problems come from the nature of rape as an offence. To some extent it is unique in that the only available evidence is generally the victim’s account and there is an absence of “independent” witnessing as most offences happen in private places such as homes of victims or offenders. Some of these issues can be attenuated through better and enforceable legal definitions of what constitutes consent and through providing better legal protections for victims.

But it does seem for the moment that a “credibility contest” between the complainant and defendant will remain a central part of contested rape trials and so act as a disincentive to the reporting and prosecution of rape as a crime.

Ciaran McCullagh was until recently a Senior Lecturer in Sociology in University College Cork and is currently an Adjunct Professor in the School of Law in the University of Limerick. He is the author of Crime in Ireland, published by Cork University Press in 1996 and is currently working on a new edition.

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