Help me help my brother

[SC84]

Hi all,

I've just had some news which has devastated me and my family and would appreciate any advice given.

This has been kept hidden by him for 6 months, but my brother was falsely accused of rape in November last year.

He had been seeing the girl in question for not very long - she had stayed with him on the Friday night and slept together.

He lives with my mum, who was away that evening, but when she came back the next day the girl in question came round shortly after and was holding hands with my brother, linking arms, chatting to my mum and being generally very pleasant.

The next weekend my mum was visiting me as it was my birthday (my brother is only 18 so family get togethers aren’t really his thing!). While she was away, a police car arrived at my mums house and took him to the local station where he was told there was a rape accusation against him. They took his DNA and told him to expect a letter about a court date.

He had kept this whole thing to himself for 6 months until my mum opened a letter from the police by accident yesterday, informing him that the charges had been dropped and he would not have to attend court on the 18th May.

My mum has spoken to the police officer who was overseeing this, and it turns out this is the second time this girl had done something like this. She was seeing her ex boyfriend at the same time as my brother, and when he questioned where she was that weekend she obviously thought this was the best way out.

I am upset and incredibly angry that she has been allowed to do this to my gentle and somewhat naive brother, as well as some other poor man, and get away with it.

He has kept this to himself for 18 months as he was ashamed and embarrassed to tell anyone.

I suppose what I'm trying to figure out is how best to support him through this, and make up for what must have been an awful time for him. I would also be very interested to hear if anyone has been through anything similar and if they brought charges against the accuser, as I feel this girl has not and will not learn her lesson.

Thanks and regards.

S x

[felix]

Hi and thanks for posting. Brave of you. Yes, I have been through hell for the past 5 months and have only just recieved a "No further action" from the police. I am trying to decid what to do with the woman concerned. Although circumstances were different, there are loads of similiarities. No rape took place, obviously, and my wife and I are now wondering what is best to do........ Be willing to talk endelssly to him if he needs it. I lack badly someone to talk to. My wife is thorouoghly fed up with me rabitting on about it and not "getting on with my life", but I have been scared for the past five months and now feeel terribly confused and tearful - I only heard the good news a few days ago.....

[SC84]

Thanks Felix and sorry to hear of your ongoing issues... I can't imagine how hard it must be

Would be very interested to hear others experiences and how your friends / family helped you pull through. He's only 18 and I'm worried this will stay with him for the rest of his life.

[felix]

Best thing was to focus on work, the snow, Libya, anthing but The Case. Sometimes you want to talk then you need someone. Other times, for days even, you want to forget and pretend. I remember walking around at Christmas seeing people out with ther kids thinking "it is so unfair, I hate you all, you have not got a rape charge hanging over you, you have NO idea how hard this all is". And I was frighterned of the police or of strange phone calls, letters or even knocks on the door....

[witsend]

Hi there, our son was put through the living hell of a false accusation over 18 months ago and it has been an uphill struggle to try to help him get over the trauma. He is 30 and has special needs which made it even harder for him to deal with. He had awful depression and violent panic attacks and even threatened suicide. Things are slowly improving but only with the help of our GP a learning difficulties Psychologist and psychiatrist. He had his case NFA'd after about 5 months from the original allegation and, to be honest, it was then that things really went down hill. It was also brought to our attention that this "female" had falsely accused male on a previous occasion. She too has special needs and we are led to believe that it was her mother who instigated the rape charge. We too would like to have seen the book thrown at this "female" but believed this would have been too traumatic for our son.