Women tell the truth: more luck with Google

[dreamer_easy]

• UK figures from a 2005 Home Office Research Study, A gap or a chasm? Attrition in reported rape cases: "Nine per cent of reported cases were designated false... However, closer analysis of this category applying Home Office counting rules reduces this to three per cent. Even the higher figure is considerably lower than the extent of false reporting estimated by police officers interviewed in this study." [My emphasis] ETA: "... the Home Office guidance on 'no criming' and false complaints in particular was not always followed with cases having neither an admission by the complainant nor strong evidentiary grounds." (Kelly 2010)
  
  
• A second paper I found, a report from the Villanova University School of Law, discusses the results of the belief that false reports are common, in the law and in police procedure, but points out: "In fact, there is no good empirical data on false rape complaints either historically or currently... As a scientific matter, the frequency of false rape complaints to police or other legal authorities remains unknown." [My emphasis] (Anderson, Michelle J. The Legacy of the Prompt Complaint Requirement, Corroboration Requirement, and Cautionary Instructions on Campus Sexual Assault. Villanova University School of Law, Public Law and Legal Theory Working Paper No. 2004-10, June 2004.)
  
  
• A Canadian figure: in a study of rape reports to the Winnebago PD in 1976 and 1977, 27.3% of the cases were labelled "unfounded", but only 5.2% were false reports. (Johnson, Stuart, Rick Linden, and Candice Minch. Attrition in the Processing of Rape Cases. Canadian Journal of Criminology 29 1987.)

Comments

[secondsilk.livejournal.com]

This is really interesting, and more than a little horrifying.

I haven't read much on the topic overall, but I have read a very interesting book exploring the stereotypes and assumptions of which rape cases will end with a conviction. As a companion to that, this is fitting in quite well.

Nine per cent of reported cases were designated false, with a high proportion of these involving 16- to 25-year-olds.

Are you interested in exploring who and in which circumstances reports of rape are likely to be considered false or unfounded?

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I think it'd be useful to look at why a reported rape might be labelled "unfounded", "no crime", etc, when in fact the veracity of the report isn't the issue.

According to that Home Office report: "The rate of 'no criming' remains high, despite repeated guidelines from the Home Office and internally within the police, specifying that it should be confined to false allegations, crimes that occurred in another area and/or were recorded as a crime in error... No study has found 'no criming' to be limited to these categories." In fact, the police were 'no criming' over a fifth of all reports.

Reports were improperly 'no crimed' because:

- the victim didn't want to continue
- the victim was too ill or vulnerable to continue
- a suspect couldn't be identified
- the suspect couldn't be found
- there wasn't enough evidence to proceed

The report's definition of a false allegation was "where the complainant makes a clear retraction or where there is strong evidence that the report was false." The police definition apparently has a lot more to do with their distrust of women who report rape - especially young women, and women who knew their attacker.

The report notes "an investigative culture in which elements that might permit a designation of a false complaint are emphasised... at the expense of a careful investigation, in which the evidence collected is evaluated. These perceptions and orientations are not lost on complainants."