<br>
<p>Surely you can't believe that. Rape victims often feel tremendous
shame and self-loathing. Additionally, as this thread proves, there is
a strong sentiment that women are often just making it up for fun.</p>
<br>
<p>What do you think is tougher to take? Shame and self-loathing or a
million in legal bills, the threat of 30 years in jail (for some it's
been more than a threat), loss of job, public humiliation, etc. The
accuser gets her name shielded in the press. What is the downside of a
false accusation? Do some research on the matter? Is it a felony? Is
it a misdemeanor? Is it prosecuted?</p>
<br>
<p>Many women are raped by acquaintances, people they (and others)
trust. If a woman is accusing a man who is, in the eyes of the
community, normal - church going, maybe a father (maybe her father or
relative), the community is going to side with him. Do you really
believe that there are no downsides to accusing someone of rape?</p>
<br>
<p>In comparison to what a falsely accused male faces, yes.</p>
<p>Where does Harold Allen go to get back his reputation?</p>
<p>AG</a> drops charge for 32-year-old rape - Boston.com</p>
<br>
<p>1) Due process. Prosecutors can use grand juries to get indictments
before an adequate investigation is done or to bypass probable cause.</p>
<p>2) Investigate the background of the accuser to see if the accuser has
a history of mental illness, has made false accusations before, etc.</p>
<p>3) Protect the identity of the accused as well as that of the accuser.</p>
<p>4) Require compensation for those unjustly convicted or accused. States
are all over the place on this. Some of the people declared innocent by
the innocence project receive large sums of money for decades of
incarceration. Some receive nothing or a token amount.</p>
<p>5) Send prosecutors to jail for malicious prosecution.</p>
<p>6) Use approved identification procedures to eliminate inherent problems
in witness identification.</p>
<p>7) There are allegations at <a href="http://liestoppers.blogspot.com/%5B/url%5D">http://liestoppers.blogspot.com/</a> that the
SANE nurse in the Duke Lacrosse Case, Tara Levicy, altered medical
records to fit the evidence as it came out. Perhaps some training to
SANE nurses about bias would be appropriate.</p>
<p>8) Depoliticization of the process. Durham is a political city with
racial issues and there were several players that wanted to make
political hay of the situation.</p>
<p>9) Look at the alibi evidence of the accused. In the Duke Lacrosse
Case, eyewitnesses and overwhelming electronic evidence were widely
available, even presented on the TV show 60 Minutes, to show that one
of the accused wasn't even there at the time. Another of the accused
had similar overwhelming alibi evidence but his lawyers didn't reveal
the information because they were afraid that the prosecution would
try to work around the alibi evidence. In fact they did try to do that
but in such a tortuous way to be incredible.</p>
<p>10) Provide good counsel for the accused. In the Duke Lacrosse Case,
the accused were able to secure excellent representation. Of course
for some of them, it was a stretch to come up with the $400,000 bond
and attorneys fees. There have been cases at the innocence project
where there was obvious exculpatory evidence but that defence counsel
was incompetent and didn't make use of it. The prosector's job is to
see that justice is done. But this conflicts with the aim to win
reelection or to get promoted.</p>
<p>11) Hold police department officials responsible. How did Gottlieb and
Himan in the Duke Lacrosse Case manage to convince a Grand Jury to
indict when they had nothing? And later Dave Evans after all of the
DNA evidence came back negative? Grand Jury testimony is secret. So
there's no accountability. If a police officer lies to a Grand Jury,
he should be prosecuted. If police department superiors continue
investigation into a non-case for political reasons, the department
should be sued. If police representatives make statements that impugn
the character of the accused, then they should be held responsible for
it.</p>
<p>12) Fix the laws. Look at the Fells Acre Daycare Center case and
Gerald Amirault. Day care sex abuse hysteria occurred in the 1980s and
early 1990s. [1] [2] This occurred mainly in the United States, with
some cases in Canada and New Zealand. A prominent case in Kern County,
California first brought the issue of day care sexual abuse to the
fore in the public consciousness, and the issue figured prominently in
news coverage for almost a decade. (Wikipedia).</p>
<br>
[QUOTE=""]
<p>I agree that it's a tough issue, but I think the laws do the best they
can. What happened to the Duke players was terrible, but I don't think
it's indicative of some police/women/courts conspiracy against accused
rapists.. I think, and general consensus seems to be that the problem
with the Duke case was that the media blew it way out of proportion
and decided that those young men were guilty, when the courts (and
only the courts) should have been passing judgment on the case.</p>
<br>
<p>The current set of lawsuits alleges a conspiracy by Duke University,
Durham Police Department and the City of Durham in railroading the
Lacrosse players. The media shares a lot of the blame but the case
should have been tossed by the police immediately.</p>
<p>I read two studies. One was your typical well-researched peer-reviewed
study. The other was a study of military personnel. These were well
discussed at Durham-In-Wonderland in either late 2005 or early 2007.</p>
<br>
<p>If you could cite a verifiable source for the 50% statistic, I'd be
interested in seeing it. The site I linked was a woman's group website
that linked to statistics reported in respected journals such as the
Guardian. I would not trust figures simply stated on a men's or
women's rights website, which is why I did not cite any.</p>
<br>
<p>Did you read the complete sources?</p>
<p>It would take me several hours to go through the posts in DIH for the
last three years. I would suggest asking Professor William L Anderson
for a link to these studies as he may have them at hand. His webpage
is at William</a> Anderson: Archives</p>
<p>The problem with tilting the scales of justice towards a particular
group is that there are some that will take advantage of the tilt.
It reminds me of the problem with moral hazard in insurance.</p>