What should be changed in the system and how should we go about it?

[Lilyput]

I would too Amanda... My home isnt home any more just a house i clean and worry about who will knock the door, i feel like a basket case a year ago i was a relaxed happy person. FAs out boozing and living it up but she can claim for trauma.

[carrot tops]

Where someone is found not guilty of rape I would like to see the complainant referred back to the CPS and a charge of perverting the course of justice brought against him or her. I would like a new police team, unconnected with the original to investigate within a short but thorough time frame and the case brought back to court. If the complainant is found guilty he or she should be named and some form of punishment or rehabilitation enforced. No one in either trial should be named unless convicted.

Immediately in court after a not guilty verdict the Judge should read victim impact statements to those present of what the accused has suffered. A package of counselling help should be made available to the innocent defendant paid for by the CPS and police. I'm sure the police and CPS could find the money for this as they would not be wasting their time on ridiculous cases.

[Rights Fighter]

I don't agree entirely with that last post. I do believe that if the complainant and/or his/her witnesses are found to be lying in evidence then they should all be prosecuted for conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.

Just as often the falsely accused are wrongly convicted, the guilty are sometimes found not guilty. I don't believe a complainant in that situation should automatically be viewed as lying, when there has been no evidence that she was.

[Franticwithworry]

Hi carrot tops, I see where you are coming from within the last bit of your post, but it can't be assumed that if the verdict is not guilty, the complainant was lying. If lies can be shown, then I agree, a full investigation should happen, prosecution and when the falsely accused is shown to be a victim, victim statements and restitution and everything. Making assumptions up front and making accusations without evidence flies in the face of what we are arguing for and will make genuine victims of rape, sexual assault and abuse afraid to come forward.

That wouldn't help in the long run.

[carrot tops]

In our case the FA admitted she had lied when she accused another person (while son was on bail ). She also said in sons case she couldn't remember if the abuse had actually happened. On such flimsy "evidence" it is wrong that he got dragged to court but there have been no legal consequences for her.

[Itsnotallbad]

[QUOTE=Rights Fighter;63871]

Unfortunately Bene is posting in the wrong part of the forums again. If you click on her username you will see her "contributions" where she writes at length about victims in the falsely accused area rather than in the FAd section.

A gentle push in the right direction always helps!

[Franticwithworry]

In our case the FA admitted she had lied when she accused another person (while son was on bail ). She also said in sons case she couldn't remember if the abuse had actually happened. On such flimsy "evidence" it is wrong that he got dragged to court but there have been no legal consequences for her.

When people admit they have lied, there certainly should be consequences and harsh ones. It's a colossal waste of money and resources to prosecute cases based on lies, as well as the incredible toll on the people falsely accused. I agree that it was absolutely wrong that he got dragged to court and that there have been no consequences for her.

I thought you were saying that any not guilty verdict should mean that the complainant should automatically be prosecuted for lying. I'm sorry if I got that wrong. But yes, in cases like your sons, it should never have got to court, but seeing as it did, and she confessed to lying (or even just if it could be proved), there should have been a full investigation into her lies and perjury and he should have been compensated. I fully agree with that.

[Itsnotallbad]

This is a tricky topic, as most of us have experienced or are close to someone who has experienced a false accusation. Because of this a lot of the views posted are coming from a clouded place, through no fault of their own.

Firstly I think we can all agree that there are more true accusations than there are false accusations of sexual crimes, I would hope that no one has swung so far the other way as to think sexual crimes never happen! i have seen stranger things happen though.

I personally think that to change how these crimes are dealt with, we need to change society as a whole. The 21st century seems to be very much about empowering women, which is great but as with most things, it can be taken to an extreme. For a long time rape as been the crime that for a lot of people only ever happened/ could happen to women. For hard line activists it is a very emotive subject to bring up to gather support. If you believe all the statistics that these groups put out you'd would think that all men are pigs and deserve to be castrated! This attitude filters through to normal people, whilst common sense and fact is pushed aside, all the average person hears is Jimmy Saville, more rapes are happening and that all women have been sexually assaulted.

Based on this we see that the head of the CPS is very hard-line when it comes to sexual crime prosecutions. The head of the Met has organised witch hunts for high profile members of society, when these were found to have no evidence, he refused to apologise, and then the Home secretary has completely brushed aside reforming bail regulations and ignored calls for defendants to be kept anonymous until a guilty verdict.

10/15 years ago this was completely different and in fact victims were cast aside. Because of out cry from this, the system has completed a 360 turn and now goes after the defendants in all aspects of their lives. Papers can write anything as long as it's based loosely on fact and you are at the beck and call of any authority.

My changes would be along these lines:

- Scrap the CPS and reform the process of public prosecution. Smarter and smoother prosecutions, protections for complainants and the accused. More questioning of the complainant by the police to test the strength of evidence. More reviews of a case with more contact between the CPS and accuser.
- More money should be made available to pay for costs for the defence of defendants and more money for the CPS to hire competent people and not the worst of the legal trade.
- Less power to be given to the police, the power of bail conditions and length should be decided by a magistrate or crown court judge. For too long unprofessional police officers have made bad choices and ruined lives.
-Support should be given to both sides. As soon as you're arrested you are given a piece of paper with the numbers of charities that can help you. I believe that you should be assigned a case worker that will be with you in court and throughout the process, helping you understand everything.
-The Police should be more transparent, as of now all they have to say is that they are either still investigating or they are in talks with the CPS etc. They should have to give exact reasons as to why the process is taking so long.
- Defendants who are able/willing to pay their defence costs and are found not guilty should have everything paid back to them. I.E Legal bills (reasonable amount ofcourse), lost wages etc.

Those are the main points I can think of for now.

Cheers

[carrot tops]

Itsnotallbad,

Your second paragraph is really challenging to me. Yes I believe sexual crimes happen and that not all are reported. However as to whether there are more sexual crimes reported than false allegations made I really don't know.

I have so little trust in how statistics can be skewed to fit a political agenda that I approach everything with cynicism now.

There is clearly corruption within the police ( I think we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg). The CPS always come out with trite answers when a case doesn't end in conviction. Have hey ever said " Sorry, in retrospect we realise this one should never have got to court ?"

Social Services will write whatever they want in reports, even if the reports are inconsistent within themselves! A good dollop of common sense , which sometimes doesn't kick in till jury stage would vastly improve what we have at the moment.

[Itsnotallbad]

Itsnotallbad,

Your second paragraph is really challenging to me. Yes I believe sexual crimes happen and that not all are reported. However as to whether there are more sexual crimes reported than false allegations made I really don't know.

I have so little trust in how statistics can be skewed to fit a political agenda that I approach everything with cynicism now.

There is clearly corruption within the police ( I think we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg). The CPS always come out with trite answers when a case doesn't end in conviction. Have hey ever said " Sorry, in retrospect we realise this one should never have got to court ?"

Social Services will write whatever they want in reports, even if the reports are inconsistent within themselves! A good dollop of common sense , which sometimes doesn't kick in till jury stage would vastly improve what we have at the moment.

My second paragraph should of been written better,i apologise. I'd love to see some solid data on false allegations but in reality you need prosecutions of false allegations to be able to have data on it. For now a lot of comments made in the media are based on some very dodgy studies!

How would you actually put what you've said into action? Would you get in contact with your MP to try to get this into parliment? I wrote this post as id love to be able to take this issue further but im really not sure how too!

[vvnn8]

Itsnotallbad,

Your second paragraph is really challenging to me. Yes I believe sexual crimes happen and that not all are reported. However as to whether there are more sexual crimes reported than false allegations made I really don't know.

I have so little trust in how statistics can be skewed to fit a political agenda that I approach everything with cynicism now.

There is clearly corruption within the police ( I think we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg). The CPS always come out with trite answers when a case doesn't end in conviction. Have hey ever said " Sorry, in retrospect we realise this one should never have got to court ?"

Social Services will write whatever they want in reports, even if the reports are inconsistent within themselves! A good dollop of common sense , which sometimes doesn't kick in till jury stage would vastly improve what we have at the moment.

The CPS and Police do their "job" and don´t look on you or your family. i.e. --> 2 drunk people have sex without condom, next day girl say rape. Cps passes DNA test if it´s ok, then nightmare start for you. The **** case is now for the court and jury. What will happen if the look at you? No work for prosecution... This is not medicine where you can always be sick cause of life. People have differents educations and if girls continue being educated with NO responsibility after drunk party and have sex more innocent man life will be devastated

[stalked]

Meeting my MP on Friday

I am meeting my MP on Friday because this forum has highlighted to me the suffering borne by hundreds of families from false allegations, largely unseen by the population at large. Anyone can be the victim of a false allegation. No one is immune, but the wider population is largely unaware of the danger until they or their family or close friends are visited by this unwelcome guest.

Of course, 1 person meeting 1 MP will change nothing. But many people meeting many MPs, along with other activities, may begin to drive the change in the criminal justice process that is so needed. Actually I am optimistic. I see the beginnings of a change of attitude. But this comes too late for many of those on this forum, and too slowly for those that will find this forum in the future.

These are the candidate ideas that I will invite my MP to think about:

1. Treat accused as innocent until proved guilty, minimising disruption to his/her life and family
2. Only remove phones and computers if they are needed for evidence i.e. usually NOT in historic cases
3. Maintain anonymity for all parties unless a conviction results
4. Recognise disruption to accused and expedite legal process
5. False allegations are an inevitable consequence of delivering justice. The cost should be borne by society as a whole, not by innocent individuals and their families.
6. Do not automatically remove individuals from their homes and families
7. Re-visit the consequences of offering compensation to accusers
8 Re-balance the role of Police so that their work aims at establishing truth, not simply gathering evidence for a prosecution and ignoring evidence that detracts from the prosecution case. Police should work for everyone.

Best wishes to everyone on the forum

Stalked

[wakingnightmare]

I am meeting my MP on Friday because this forum has highlighted to me the suffering borne by hundreds of families from false allegations, largely unseen by the population at large. Anyone can be the victim of a false allegation. No one is immune, but the wider population is largely unaware of the danger until they or their family or close friends are visited by this unwelcome guest.

Of course, 1 person meeting 1 MP will change nothing. But many people meeting many MPs, along with other activities, may begin to drive the change in the criminal justice process that is so needed. Actually I am optimistic. I see the beginnings of a change of attitude. But this comes too late for many of those on this forum, and too slowly for those that will find this forum in the future.

These are the candidate ideas that I will invite my MP to think about:

1. Treat accused as innocent until proved guilty, minimising disruption to his/her life and family
2. Only remove phones and computers if they are needed for evidence i.e. usually NOT in historic cases
3. Maintain anonymity for all parties unless a conviction results
4. Recognise disruption to accused and expedite legal process
5. False allegations are an inevitable consequence of delivering justice. The cost should be borne by society as a whole, not by innocent individuals and their families.
6. Do not automatically remove individuals from their homes and families
7. Re-visit the consequences of offering compensation to accusers
8 Re-balance the role of Police so that their work aims at establishing truth, not simply gathering evidence for a prosecution and ignoring evidence that detracts from the prosecution case. Police should work for everyone.

Best wishes to everyone on the forum

Stalked

I think they're all excellent suggestions especially your last point.

I believe that the falsely accused acknowledge there are many genuine cases of rape and abuse and we would hate to see the system swing back to the attitude of they were asking for it and victims being too scared to come forward. The problem lies in the assumption by society that there are no false accusations. People struggle to believe that someone would lie about these types of allegations. Why when society accepts people in all walks of life lie about everything else is a sex crime perceived as being a no go area for liars.

[Shah]

Well put walking nightmare..

My son sent to prison on word of mouth, no evidence, no nothing, dates changed ... no publicity and why is that? probably because it was all such a joke and it would give others ideas too.. Post it notes to remind them what to say not interested in sons laptop.....total joke ...
As for the plod doing anything well you could have fooled me took a year, plenty of time for the FA to be coached and my husband is 100% certain that the actual jury was got at...

Of topic I guess sorry

All I remember is someone somewhere said that is was very rare that False Allegations happened.. tell that to those that are suffering because of them and their familes too whom will never ever be the same again, FA destroys lives and unless a member of parliment or house of lords has a loved one falsely accused things will never change.

[Itsnotallbad]

I am meeting my MP on Friday because this forum has highlighted to me the suffering borne by hundreds of families from false allegations, largely unseen by the population at large. Anyone can be the victim of a false allegation. No one is immune, but the wider population is largely unaware of the danger until they or their family or close friends are visited by this unwelcome guest.

Of course, 1 person meeting 1 MP will change nothing. But many people meeting many MPs, along with other activities, may begin to drive the change in the criminal justice process that is so needed. Actually I am optimistic. I see the beginnings of a change of attitude. But this comes too late for many of those on this forum, and too slowly for those that will find this forum in the future.

These are the candidate ideas that I will invite my MP to think about:

1. Treat accused as innocent until proved guilty, minimising disruption to his/her life and family
2. Only remove phones and computers if they are needed for evidence i.e. usually NOT in historic cases
3. Maintain anonymity for all parties unless a conviction results
4. Recognise disruption to accused and expedite legal process
5. False allegations are an inevitable consequence of delivering justice. The cost should be borne by society as a whole, not by innocent individuals and their families.
6. Do not automatically remove individuals from their homes and families
7. Re-visit the consequences of offering compensation to accusers
8 Re-balance the role of Police so that their work aims at establishing truth, not simply gathering evidence for a prosecution and ignoring evidence that detracts from the prosecution case. Police should work for everyone.

Best wishes to everyone on the forum

Stalked

Great points Stalked, any suggestions on how to get more members to contact their MP?