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Fighting Against Those Who Rape
Devoted fans of the popular cop show can probably recite it in their sleep: "In the criminal justice system, sexually based offenses are considered especially heinous. In New York City, the dedicated detectives who investigate these vicious felonies are members of an elite squad known as the Special Victims Unit. These are their stories."
Those stories on Law & Order: SVU are fiction (although they frequently echo tabloid headlines), but these statistics are not: Every two minutes someone in the United States is sexually assaulted. One out of six American women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime. But only forty percent of these crimes will be reported. Only six percent of rapists spend a day in jail.
These devastating numbers are at the very soul of a new documentary that offers an inside look at a real-life SVU -- the sex crimes prosecution unit of the New York District Attorney's office, the first of its kind in the country. Produced by Lisa F. Jackson, Sex Crimes Unit premieres on HBO, Monday, June 20, at 8 p.m. ET/PT, and will be repeated throughout the rest of the month and into July. Look for it.
In the interest of full disclosure, Lisa is a longtime friend with whom I began in the television business in Washington, DC, back in the days when 24-hour cable news cycles, American Idol and video on demand weren't even glints in the narrowed eyes of Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch.
A couple of years ago, I wrote about her film, The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo, a brutal and frank verite examination of the African civil war that has been the deadliest conflict since World War II, with as many as 5.4 million killed and more than 250,000 women and children raped. Herself a rape survivor, she bravely trekked into the heart of the fighting to tell the tale. Now with Sex Crimes Unit, Lisa presents a story she has been longing to bring to the screen for the last fifteen years.
Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau authorized the unit's formation in 1974 with the now famous crime novelist and former prosecutor Linda Fairstein as its first chief. "When I came to the practice of law in 1972, the laws in America, all over this country, were so archaic that the overwhelming number of sexual assault cases were not even able to get into a court of law," Fairstein notes in the documentary. "As recently as 20 years ago, marital rape was not a crime. There was no such thing as stalking, there was no DNA, there was no science to say she's right or she's wrong about identifying her attacker, acquaintance rapes simply weren't prosecuted almost anywhere in America."
Today, Lisa Friel heads the unit. Deeply street smart and an expert in the law (despite, to my aging eyes at least, a more than passing resemblance to Michele Bachmann), she oversees 40 senior assistant DA's with, on any given day, more than 300 pending cases. In the course of filming, these include a nightclub abduction caught on surveillance tape, the perpetrator brazenly carrying the helplessly inebriated victim out of the joint with no one lifting a finger to stop him; a livery cab driver turned predator and the difficult case of a prostitute turned rape victim whose quick thinking and courage results in a twelve year sentence for her attacker. "I am so happy [the jury] saw me as a person, not a prostitute," she tells assistant DA Coleen Balbert. "Nobody deserves to be raped," Lisa Friel says, "no matter who they are and what they do."
But at the program's center is the remarkable story of Natasha Alexenko. On August 6, 1993, the then-20-year-old Canadian college student was raped and sodomized at gunpoint in the bicycle storage area of her uptown Manhattan apartment building. Her assailant got away.
At the time, a rape kit was administered and DNA evidence collected but it sat on a shelf, untested, for nine and a half years. "It was sealed and nothing happened to it," Assistant DA Melissa Mourges recalls. "And that happened with 17,000 kits around the city... the seals were never broken. But then in 2000, two things happened that were very big for New York City and very big for the victims of these kind of crimes. One was that our medical examiner's office which does all of the DNA testing for the five boroughs joined CODIS [Combined DNA Index System], the data bank... so now we had profiles of known individuals that you could compare crime scene evidence to."
The second was District Attorney Morgenthau's establishing a cold case investigative operation within the sex crimes unit and creating a “John Doe” indictment; in the absence of a suspect, his DNA could be indicted, slamming the brakes on the statute of limitations.
The cold case unit reopened the Natasha Alexenko investigation nearly ten years after she was raped. The DNA of her assailant was entered into CODIS. Four years later, they got a hit. A suspect was arrested and prosecuted.
"There was a part of me that absolutely felt that it would be cathartic to go through the process of a trial," Alexenko says, "and there was a part of me that thought there's just no way, I don't want to do this." On the stand, she collapses -- "It was almost like this was the physical embodiment of all of the fear and all of the guilt and all of the sadness," a friend says -- but recovers and performs what she calls her "karmic duty to get up there and keep this guy from ever doing this again to anyone else."
"The trial," Assistant DA Mourges says, "is really... the moment when the victim takes all the power back, all the power that he wielded over her, all the shame, all the terror. And now she holds all that power. She holds the power over him, and that is a transcendent moment." Her attacker was convicted, with a maximum release date of 2057.
This week, as press attention centered on whether the New York State Senate would pass legislation allowing gay marriage, that same body passed a bill that expands the state's DNA database to require a sample from all those convicted of felonies and misdemeanors (up to now, only 46% of penal law crimes have been eligible).
The New York Civil Liberties Union is opposed. "On Law & Order or CSI, DNA is infallible. Unfortunately, in the real world, things aren't so simple; the possibility for error, fraud and abuse exists at every step from the moment a DNA sample is collected,” NYCLU Legislative Director Robert Perry said. "...The science and sophistication have advanced, and yet lawmakers have not even begun to think about what's required in terms of regulatory oversight and quality assurance standards that are required to ensure the integrity of the databank and the use of forensic DNA evidence."
Meanwhile, Natasha Alexenko has founded Natasha's Justice Project, raising money to end the backlog of rape kits in America. While a minority of law enforcement jurisdictions in the United States -- among them, New York City, Los Angeles, and the state of Illinois -- require that every rape kit booked into police evidence is sent to a crime laboratory and tested for DNA, the vast majority do not. According to the website endthebacklog.org, "Experts in the federal government estimate that there are hundreds of thousands of untested rape kits in police and crime lab storage facilities throughout the United States." With increasing cuts in law enforcement budgets, outside assistance from groups like Alexenko's may be the only alternative.
Toward the end of Sex Crimes Unit, she tells Lisa Jackson, "You have a choice in life of how to take things. Believe me, I had moments of feeling sorry for myself and I guess you can do that, choose to go that route, or you can choose to not be the victim. I guess if you gain strength from it and if you come out of it with something more then you won, then you were never the victim."
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34 Comments so far
Show AllThere are different forms of rape, and a "woman" poster who goes by Katrine or Katrine Lachette (The Hatchet), who has sided AGAINST me whenever I've posted genuine, heartfelt, humane concerns about the levels of violence directed towards women as seen in too many portions of our broken world, is not one to speak honestly on this topic.
I am re-posting this gem, left by this HATE monger. It is completely based on false evidence, intended to damage my credibility in the forum. As I have had the unfortunate NEED to relate many times, there is a group that has targeted me in this forum, and because it's tough to prove that, when I answer each one's allegations, needing to point out the compromised level of characters that would wage such hostility at me, I am accused by this group of being prone to attacking people in the forum.
Anyone who has appreciated the level of sincerity and cognition that I've brought to this forum, please regard this seriously. (If they do this to me, they can and will do it to others.) By the tactic of having a number of their members attack me, it makes it SEEM that I have issues or problems with too many people on C.D. Naturally this provides the appearance that I am the one who "has trouble getting along." This is part of the campaign to discredit me.
This 100% false material was published by this imposter, and notice its authoritarian tone, as if she had info to back up these intentionally damaging allegations. I am sending this to the CD management in a certified letter. Enough is enough! Free speech does not include the right to LIE about others. And those who use this tactic have NO ethics, and should be discredited.
Posted by katrinelachatte
Jun 17 2011 - 11:27am
Thank you, Gerald.
I wish someone would have spoken those words before I was banned. I had a bad flaming between Rose and two male posters. In conjunction with the flaming was repetitive flagging, even when my posts had nothing to pertain to SR and her accomplices. As someone said earlier last week, she can make people disappear like Pinochet. Especially during a donation drive.
One of her accomplices had his name banned, which was fine. But then he was the least of the offenders. It appears the biggest culprits had no consequences. I suspect that had something to do with donation amounts. I'm also inclined to think that SR is a good benefactress to CD since I've seen her fairly often over the past year refer people to her website. In the business networking world, palm greasing is the norm if a site or business helps to carry your wares.
I really don't regret now my expression of anger and pain that led to my banning in February. The flaming incident set off memories from over 20 years ago when my roommate and I, who were students at the time, were stalked in a small and older house we shared. I really had no idea that I could still be impacted by the experience, but I was. Later, we (my roommate and I) learned that we had managed to avoid being victimized by a serial rapist who murdered his victims. It was truly a close, razor-line kind of escape.
I'm also responding to the earlier post you made on how destructive online harassment can actually be. I read it yesterday and didn't have the time to respond, and I really didn't want to scroll through all the garbage this morning to get to it. People are vulnerable to being called Nazis, too, like HK, especially if they were raised by a survivor of that era.
Yesterday SR's new meme of Nazism was being loosely thrown around on the Fukushima article, if I remember correctly. I barely read the posts, as in I skimmed through them very, very quickly, but it was being used to individuals and directed in a general sense to detractors. At least it was taken down. Frankly, Common Dreams disgusts me at times to no measure.
So this morning I just thought I'd lift up another leaf over Common Dreams, as a publication and its supporters. The contrast between my banning and SR's abuses and uses of the forum leaves me bitter, despite more people seeing through her.
I really need to be getting out of this toxic environment. But at least this time I'm leaving of my own accord, and with a small measure of vindication without feeling like a victim.
Don't worry about ringleader bully Shitrose. She's a peck of fraud shit and a warmonger. She tried to associate me with some other guy on this forum. I forgot his name but she had to back away after she got caught lying. Don't let that bully torment you. You'll know that she's losing when one of her sock puppets such as Maiden and others in her goon squad for a drive by shootout.
Here's another secret. That dude who goes by the handle "Gerald" has been here before. He went by the name "Namaste", a few dozen other handles each time he got banned, came back later as "Justice Arcs", got banned, came back as Hughnanimous, must have gotten banned again, and then changed his handle to "Gerald". He's sr's biggest sock puppet.
I predict that either I'll get flagged by Shitrose or one of her sock puppets or the fat hag will give another terror response. Good luck staying here. I'm outta here.
Katrinelachatte,
"It strikes me as a Draconian measure."
Everything the government does in this country is Draconian! Why do anthing when it needs to be done when they can "extend and pretend"?
The fall of global governments will be here "within" three years. Prepeare yourself for the ultimate collapse!
I don't know enough about what the ACLU is arguing to say whether or not I agree.
However, I do know that when it comes to rape, as with other male violence against women, left-wingers are quite likely to bring up the fact that "the system" is racist, which is true. But then, how many times have you heard progressives argue murder should be legalized (I am thinking of arguments regarding legalizing prostitution) because the laws are currently enforced in a racist way?
http://womononajourney.wordpress.com
As one who can speak for the victims of rape, I applaud every measure that can, will, and must be taken to bring the perpatrators of the heinous crime of rape to justice. There should be NO statute of limitations applied to rape laws. I never get a moments peace; why should the rapists? They should be hunted mercilously and ripped to shreds to the degree that they inflicted on their victim(s).
That said, I agree with katrinelachatte that it is a slippery slope as we have this problem with our government structure- at EVERY level- having these gross credibility, accountability, and preferential issues. What a country, what a world.
A favorite commentor of mine, ShadowDancer tells us that "it is best to forgive". Probably so, but I can't.
Yes- that is the rub. USA officialdom can not be entrusted with such sophisticated mechanisms. But the problem should not be swept under a rug like the NYC examples you provided; even though it is! It's horrible beyond description.
My own "experience" in Atlanta has left me forever ANTI cop. I don't feel that I am owed; I have done remarkably well (in my opinion anyway) in recovering and learning from what happened. I survive and thrive because that is what I choose to do. EMDR (a psycholiogical process) was and still is a tremendous assistance in regaining control of my own mind.
It's sad that this topic doesn't seem to draw people like some of the others with the 150+ comments, but that's the way it is. "My men ain't gonna want to investigate no case like this. You white boys ought to know you can't be out in the streets of Atlanta at night." - that was my official response from the APD. It's a surreal experience getting the exact treatment that was inflicted on black victims of racist white crimes- like being on the other side of a looking glass. The FBI, GBI and CDC were more interested than those cretins, but that's another layer to an event too horrible for amuriKKKans to acknowledge.
Thanks for talking with me on topic.
I would also add, that were I possessed of the clout that Katrine alleges, I would have GLADLY had her banned, along with no less than 10 other posters... but of course, these I.T. experts just manage to snake back into the forum wearing a new name as their mask, so they can set up their target practice; and aim their character assassination bullets at those they deem too radical, those capable of lifting the conversation outside of the existing parameters, which, when you think about it, is the ONLY way to alter the outcomes that have led our world to more than one abyss.
In case others have not noticed, there is a loosely aligned group of posters, many of whom are here mostly to reinforce each other's posts. That, after all, provides an erstaz system of validation, by giving the impression that something valid and important is being shared. It's also become obvious that most of these people happen to endorse Ron Paul and have been slyly burying the subliminal, that we vote for him! If anyone wants to publish ALL of Paul's positions, I'd like to see them. My understanding is that he's right wing, against any form of business regulation, while also entertaining very fundamentalist views towards women and their reproductive destinies.
That type of authoritarian construct might explain why a feminist, and mystic, and anti-military "type" such as myself, is regarded as such a dangerous figure to them. I'm watching their game of "isolate the radical," and it helps to explain the HATE they project my way. Having endured this for 2 years (off and on), I don't feel any need to show these people tolerance or a polite response.
In the "Fig Leaf" thread published a few days ago, High Karate accused ME of attacking him. If anyone would like to check the record, this poster published about FIFTY comments, 80% of them railing against me. All the while indicating in most of them, that I am the one who's unbalanced. (I wrote 2 about him, initially, asking why it was that he felt he had the right to discredit the article's author.)
Meanwhile, when I point out these orchestrated attacks, their M.O. and probable nature, someone like SCRIBE appears to suggest I am evidencing paranoia. I wonder if he'd see it that way if posters shared gossip about him at 2 AM? On a fairly regular basis?
This is not the first time I've been placed in the hot seat, made the subject not of debate, but of gossip between members of this group. Often their posts run the tactic of having one playing good cop (Max Payne) and another playing bad cop (in this case Jason Dylan). It's an effective character assassination tactic in that both parties essentially reinforce the same memes, those largely based on LIES. (The right wing, as seen in its domination of radio, is quite fond of the power of the lie(s) told often enough.) I just printed 35 pages from the Fig Leaf thread, alone, that directly pertain to their accusations against me. In an era where law still meant something, I would test the legal envelope here.
So, I ask how any of you would feel, if you found yourself the subject of this type of repeated attack? And to anyone who thinks I "bring it on," that is tantamount to saying the girl in the red dress deserved to be raped.
What I've experienced, and also defend when it's used against other CD posters, as well as authors of articles, is of the nature of slander. The nebulous nature of the web allows the honest and principled to be scorned, while those who hide behind a web of obfuscation feign their innocence and alleged high purposes.
By the way, Katrine, I have not donated as much to CD as I might have mostly because I feel I have donated THOUSANDS of dollars in the form of free content. I have been paid $1. per work in my career, and for the 5000 plus posts I've generously contributed to this forum, that tithe is into the hundreds of thousands of dollars by my karmic count. And considering as payment I have to endure the sickening battery of posters like you, well, kid, it doesn't put me into the most generous of moods.
Sneer if you like, it suits you.
I apologize to anyone who thinks I enjoy this, or am responsible for its redundant display.
Jclientelle: If you read this, I recall on a thread some time ago where Katrine took the hatchet to me, trying to discredit my feminist bona fides while "siding" with Dream Joe Hope, the most blatant misogynist in this forum. Interestingly enough, you made many of the same points I did. No one went after you, sir. So it's quite easy for you to take the high ground and suggest this stuff is simply of the sort one should pass by. IF a time comes when you become targeted, you may remember my experience. There are many intellects, some as finely honed as sharp blades in the C.D. forum, but there is a dearth of genuine empathy. One place that shows up is in the lack of comments that follow ANY article relevant to women's rights, women in Haiti, and even the levels of violence projected at the half of the human race that might not necessarily prefer that Mars rules.
"Often their posts run the tactic of having one playing good cop (Max Payne)"
I don't understand where you got that assumption from but I had nothing personal against anyone. We've had our disputes long ago in the past and I'm glad that we reconciled. Regardless of our agreements and disagreements on issues and strategies, you have my full respect as always. If you could be specific and let me know what exactly it is I said in the thread under the "Fig Leaf" article that offended you, I would be more than glad to discuss so that we can resolve it and clear up our misunderstandings. I can't promise everything but I always do my best to improve over time.
tl;dr
: ( I have tried to defend your character, intellect, intentions and right to post on several occasions. I do not understand the vitriol sometimes directed against you. We disagree about several things, but then who doesn't?
I do not know if the entire paragraph including the accusation of lacking compassion is directed toward me. I am often among those few who comment on Haiti. Just to check, I did a Google search for jclientelle and Haiti in Commondreams over the past year and came up with 65 hits. Women's issues are part of everything, so not so easy to document.
BTW, I have also been accused and attacked, unfairly sometimes in my opinion. I still believe that endless back and forths degrade the discussion. You really do not have to defend yourself at length from people who are determined to be nasty. I responded to you because I believe you are sincerely concerned. You are above the level of the character assassins. Let your posts stand on their merit. I have pledged to ignore pure nastiness. But I suppose we disagree on that.
The defense rests.
That people in this country like to watch these pathetic shows is only half the story. The other half is the fact that people are just not trained or motivated to care for one another in healthy ways. Worse, some of them conflate caring with policing and it's unfortunate and dangerous because it only encourages people to be more uncaring and get into the habit of saying "just let the police take care of it". The truth is that even the police aren't perfect and siding with the rapist can happen crazy as it is.
Now don't get me wrong. I don't completely endorse taking the law into one's own hands but if I'm in a situation where it could be too little too late for the potential victim by the time the ambulances and/or police arrive, then I take my chances and intervene to prove to myself and others that yes I care too and that we should all work together to prevent tragedies such as rape and murder as much as possible. Think about this. Most victims aren't anywhere as close to being as lucky as victims in the TV shows as far as recovering from rape or getting any compensation from the damage is concerned.
"Most victims aren't anywhere as close to being as lucky as victims in the TV shows as far as recovering from rape or getting any compensation from the damage is concerned."
You got that right. Compensation doesn't really enter in to it; unless one is uninsured I would guess.
As a survivor I don't like it when people tell me what I should feel and what I should do.
I refuse to hate. I refuse to have feelings of vengence.
I just want to live well and happily.
Which I am. I have wonderful men in my life, good men.
Compensation? The thought never occurred to me.
I really don't give a damn about perps as long as they don't do it nor do it again. iow, jail.
How odd that this is actually one of the positive articles in the news. That so much has changed to help victims of rape in the past 20 years and that these women are getting their day in court - a statistically rare event! I remember the old days and they were not good for women knowing what to do about bad situations. Either you got somebody to get revenge or you kept your mouth shut.
There are always other options, there always has been.
Seeking physical and mental health care but not going through the justice system.
The "justice" system IS a bad ride, at least it was then, and it probably still is.
Sioux Rose....I love everything you post. The spiritual insight provides more for those with eyes to see, ears to hear than you may feel at this time but make no mistake, we can see what's going on here and we've got your back.
Copied off someone else's past comment. Who you trying to fool?
Fighting against those who rape? I first thought this was an article about the banksters at Goldman $acks. Then I thought it might be an article about 2.4 million Amerikans in the nation's buttaf*@kkking prison $ystem. However... it's just another article about the actual act of rape. Odd that nothing was mentioned about child rapes, a specialty of Catholick priests. Ooops! My pen slipped again. Sorry!
This is good and nice however I have noticed a certain disturbing trend with such things. Police the DA's and to some extent the court system has in many instances displayed a certain level of biased in many sexual assault cases that privlidges the "victim" in ways not typical in other forms of criminal legal action or investigation. This article along with others I have read makes a fundamental mistake in assuming that the low rate of conviction and reporting are some how due to neglect or malice in the judicial system. From what I can tell it has more to do with the fact that most cases of what we call sexual assault or stalking are far more gray in reality and legally speaking than we like to admit. No one would debate the stranger in alley attacking someone they are not accquainted with, however two equally drunk people at a party is a different matter. I have noticed that there are a lot of young women who have learned to exploit this new found awareness of "sexual victimhood" to their advantage either in their relationship or in marriages. In a sense it is a perpetuation of the worst kind of misogyny in that it uses the woman as victim motif in the worst possible way. Unfortunately to many people dismiss this even in allegedly enlightened circles. Of course I am certain I too will be dismissed, along with the men's rights movement however at least I have given you something to consider......
"This article along with others I have read makes a fundamental mistake in assuming that the low rate of conviction and reporting are some how due to neglect or malice in the judicial system"
You claim it makes fundamental mistake.
"From what I can tell it has more to do with the fact that most cases of what we call sexual assault or stalking are far more gray in reality and legally speaking than we like to admit"
What is "grey in reality"? In your opinion does how a woman is dressed one of those "grey in reality" issues? Her past sexual history?
" From what I can tell it has more to do with the fact that most cases of what we call sexual assault or stalking are far more gray in reality and legally speaking than we like to admit. No one would debate the stranger in alley attacking someone they are not accquainted with, however two equally drunk people at a party is a different matter"
Yes, it is a different matter.
Since the majority of rapes is NOT some stranger in an alley attacking someone. The majority of rapes / attempted assaults are done by someone the victim knows.
"I have noticed that there are a lot of young women who have learned to exploit this new found awareness of "sexual victimhood" to their advantage either in their relationship or in marriages. In "
No means no. Agreed?
"Of course I am certain I too will be dismissed, along with the men's rights movement however at least I have given you something to consider......
.."
Oh boo hoo, poor you. If you want a serious discussion, then don't whine and moan that people might not agree with you. If you do, then no, you won't get a serious discussion.
Update: I should have included an earlier article that I had read when I commented on this article. Interestingly, it was written by a woman on what men are trying to do to end gender based violence. I recommend this article to everyone including the author, MW.
http://www.alternet.org/story/151304
Rape is not a serious crime in the US, and the courts have a long history of making this unequivocally clear. Laws mean nothing if they are not enforced: on the books, laws only show "we mean well, " and offer a sheepish shrug of apology when they are broken and go unprosecuted...
I have often wondered why rape is still illegal: the "new scientific studies" licensing and so unleashing uncontrollable male desire can make a convincing argument that no law should go against nature or biology. If all women were made whores of by the whims of men, what of it? The comments of men on this forum alone, never mind others, make no pretense of their utter indifference to the abuses of women in our society. The heroic efforts to diminish or deflect any attention or address given to the struggles of women to hold dignity over their own bodies and minds is no small testimony to how little a woman really matters unless one of three holes is being filled in the argument...
So why are we having this discussion? Legalize domestic violence, legalize rape and molestation, legalize all abuses of women. What difference does it make? Why leave those laws on the books as a footnote? Just take them off. As for the consequences, women and girls suffer them, anyway. Many of the raped and abused turn out to be sluts, whores, strippers and porn stars...
so the legalization of rape is a win-win situation.
Nice sarcasm. Although here is a serious legal question: There is little in reality differentiating domestic violence, rape stalking etc. from assault and lesser forms of harasssment. Why then should the law differentiate?