|
|
| Drug-assisted date rapes are on rise. It is hard to prosecute because victims often don't recall crime details. The victims of drug-assisted rape don't have a chance to say no. An odorless, flavorless sedative is secretly mixed into a drink, then they lose consciousness. Victims get a pounding headache and are aware someone had sex with them but that is all they know or remember. If a blood test is done within hours the drug may be detected but usually it can not. A physical examination will determine whether they have been sexually active, but cannot prove it was rape unless the victim can remember details. It does make prosecution that much more difficult because you have a victim who cannot recall anything after taking a drink. Prosecuting such sexual assaults is a problem authorities are facing more often as the inexpensive drugs offer an easy way for sexual predators to get what they want. |
| Rape statistics have been going up, not down. Most of the rapes reported have been acquaintance rapes. Most involved the use of drugs, including alcohol, to obvious excess. In some cases, there is additional evidence: videotapes were evidence in several rape cases. |
| Yet it often is a woman's suspicion against the word of a defendant—and, sometimes, that's not enough. |
| Experts say: The body quickly flushes out many of the so-called "date rape" drugs and medical findings of rough sex don't necessarily mean it was not consensual. Sometimes, women pass out after simply drinking too much, although that doesn't make nonconsensual sex less of a crime. A lot of times it's not drugs, it's still alcohol. |
| Authorities say there are steps women can take to protect themselves, including not accepting drinks. Women can also go out in groups and watch out for one another. Also, if they suspect something is wrong, it is essential to report it right away. |
 |
|
those first few hours, or day or day and a half, are critical to get evidence. |
|
|
| It's not just adults who are sexually victimizing teens. They're also doing it to themselves. A Minnesota psychologist whose study of more than 80,000 state high school students found that 9 percent of the girls and 6 percent of the boys reported date rape and/or violence on a date. |
| Further, the study found that traumatic dating experiences were linked to a sharp increase in self-destructive behaviors like suicide attempts and eating disorders. People always think about strangers and other adults when they think of sexual abuse of young people and tend to forget about date-related experiences. This is another form of violence that we need to be on the alert for. |
| The study involved data from the 1998 Minnesota Student Survey, an annual survey of 9th and 12th grade students in public high schools across the state. It found that about 3,500 girls and 2,400 boys said that they had experienced date rape, violence on a date or both at least once. |
| More than one-third of the abused teens said they experienced both rape and other violence on dates, and of those, half had tried suicide. Among that group, the incidence of eating disorders, like overusing laxatives or diet pills, binge-eating or vomiting, was higher than teens who weren't sexually abused by their peers. Doctors should be looking at and considering the effects of date rape in young adults as part of their treatment. I would encourage all medical and mental health specialists to add to their assessments questions pertaining to date-related violence. |
| These are significant risk factors. It is really critical that we understand the prevalence of peer abuse. |
|
|
 |
|
Perspectives on Acquaintance Rape
|
|
|
 |
 |
