Can you handle another slice of life? Here’s a story about a woman trying to report a sexual assault. Just from that description, you know it’s going to be full of triggers, so consider yourself warned.
It’s too bad it doesn’t name the city where this happens, because there’s a certain police department that really needs its staff better trained.
Jesus. LC was lucky to have a friend in the know, who was able to get hold of KR. If that’s the treatment she recieved even under those circumstances, I hate to think what the average woman has to go through when trying to report.
Name a city.
I’ve read enough accounts just like this that I’m convinced many police departments don’t want to pursue sexual assault cases and do everything possible to dissuade victims from filing charges. I’m also not surprised by the ER doc’s response; When I worked the ER many years ago, I often saw this same callous attitude. Often times the SANE nurse was the only one who showed compassion and didn’t blame the victim.
Sorry to double post but I’ve something else to add. When a sexual assault victim came to triage, the acronym was ASA for alleged sexual assault. We didn’t list back pain as alleged back pain or abdominal pain as alleged ABD pain.
Reading that account, perhaps not all hope is lost for that particular police department. At least the two police officers in the hospital, described as not perfectly sensitive but not unsympathetic either, helped the victim with her complaint about the treatment she received at the police station. That should count for something. How many officers would just automatically side with their colleagues in such a case.
Recently, in my area a 12 year old girl was almost raped. This was at midnight. I was pleased when the police spokesman said on TV that this kind of assault should not happen no matter what time it was or where it occurred
LC’s initial treatment at the police station was indeed appalling. As well as the response of the XYZ representative that was handling the night calls. I am sure she is thankful that the situation improved considerably once KR arrived and became involved.
Borax #4:
“When a sexual assault victim came to triage, the acronym was ASA for alleged sexual assault. We didn’t list back pain as alleged back pain or abdominal pain as alleged ABD pain.”
That’s really sickening, the institutionalization of defaulting to “the woman’s probably lying”. I wonder if a man coming with a bloody nose and a cut above his eye from an assault is called an Alleged Assault?
swampfoot @8:
“Alleged” doesn’t mean “probably lying”. When attached to a crime (such as sexual assault), it just means “not proven in a court of law”. In the case of the man with the bloody nose and the cut, if the hospital mentioned the assault at all (rather than just the symptoms) it would (or should) use “alleged” to describe it.
borax @4:
I’ve often wondered that too.
Perhaps someone skilled in law (how do we send out the Crip Dyke signal?) has some knowledge in this area.
TRIGGER WARNING (unsympathetic officers):
Yup, that’s about how that shit is handled. Right down to the initial promise of support being followed by brutal bullshit. When I was there for a friend reporting a rape, her initial call was to a person who was pretty sympathetic and supportive and promised that there’d be a trauma-aware officer dispatched. What actually arrived was a jarhead fuck who kept trying to get her to drop pressing charges and wouldn’t even take notes for the formal reporting until about an hour of trying to brow-beat her over how impossible the case would be and besides she probably consented and she should drop the charges. I’m still pissed about the whole thing months later.
I remember reading a study a while ago that one of the reasons that police officers are less likely to take reports of rape or domestic violence seriously is because police officers are considerably more likely than general society to commit those crimes in private life and that reduces the amount of support and increases the resistance to training regimens.