BID TO STOP RAPE VICTIMS BEING QUIZZED ON THEIR SEXUAL HISTORY
WELSH MP Liz Saville Roberts is launching a bid to prevent the crossexamination of rape complainants about their sexual history.
There is widespread concern in parliament that in the wake of the Ched Evans retrial women will be less likely to report rape.
Footballer Mr Evans was cleared of rape in a retrial last year. The jury was permitted to hear details of the complainant’s sexual history.
This triggered calls for a change in the law to ensure such disclosures do not become routine.
The Dwyfor Meirionnydd Plaid Cymru MP has worked with the charity Voice4Victims on the preparation of a Bill to stop victims being quizzed about their sexual partners and past behaviour.
There were 35,798 complaints of rape in 2015-16 in Wales and England but just 2,689 convictions were recorded.
Ms Roberts hopes her Bill will give the UK a version of the “Rape Shield Law” found in the United States, Canada and Australia. It is intended to “prevent a victim from being put on trial for their clothing, attitude, behaviour or sexual history”.
Under her Bill, details about behaviour could only be used as evidence if it would be “manifestly unjust to treat them as inadmissible”.
Last year female Labour MPs pushed for a change in the law after Mr Evans’ retrial, warning that a “dangerous precedent” had been set that “how a victim of rape, usually a woman, has behaved in the past can be taken as evidence of the way she behaved at the time of the alleged rape”.
They added: “This will deter victims from disclosing their abuse and will reduce the number of victims presenting their cases to the police for fear of having their private lives investigated.”
Ms Roberts’ Bill would give further protection to complainants.
It would stop the police in certain circumstances disclosing a victim’s identity to a “stranger attacker”. The Bill would also extend the range of serious offences that can be sent to the Court of Appeal on grounds of “undue leniency”.
Ms Roberts said: “It is neither right nor just that a victim of rape can be questioned in court on matters not relevant to the case in hand. Yet in the recent past victims have been humiliated by lawyers asking questions about their sexual partners, their clothing and appearance.
“Such practices will undoubtedly make victims reluctant to come forward and more likely to drop complaints and there is already anecdotal evidence that high profile cases involving such evidence being used has led to a drop in the number of women who are coming forward.
“The core purpose of this Bill is to prevent such intrusive and damaging questioning. It will replicate the so-called Rape Shield Law which exists in Australia, Canada and most of the United States and prevent a complainant’s sexual history from being used in a trial as an indicator of the victim’s character.
“Rape Shield Laws have been introduced in other countries to protect victims from the emotional trauma of being questioned about their sexual history on the witness stand, and it is time for victims here to be afforded the same protections.”
Harry Fletcher, direc- tor of Voices4Victims, said: “There is clear and overwhelming evidence that rape victims are questioned about their previous sexual history, behaviour and appearance. This would not happen to victims involved in other types of trials. Changes to legislation are needed urgently. The Government needs to act now.”
Claire Waxman, who founded the charity, added: “This brutal cross-examination of rape victims re-traumatises the victim and causes them irreparable harm. It’s this victimblaming attitude [that] needs to be stamped out from the justice process.”