Victim censored in Rape Trial

You cannot say "rape" and you cannot say "sexual assault", but you can call it "sex" or "intercourse". This is what Judge Cheuvront told Tory Bowen before she had to testify against her rapist, Pamir Safi. During the first trial Ms. Bowen conformed to this silencing rule and spent 13 hours on the stand carefully qualifying her testimony in order to make sure the defendant, not herself, had a fair trial.

Rape trials do not simply determine whether a defendant is guilty of sexually harming the victim, they often are truly trials of the victim to determine if he/she really was harmed at all. Sexual assault law results in such framings at trial since sexual assault revolves around whether the victim "consented" or not to sexual contact (as opposed to scrutinizing a defendant's actions employed to dimish consent), and this often boils down to a classic "he said, she said". This is difficult enough to successfully prosecute without censoring what "she" has to say regarding the violence her body suffered.

The first trial ended in a hung jury and upon the eve of the second trial Tory Bowen decided to speak out by refusing to sign away her right to use the word 'rape', meaning she faced jail time if she testified using those words at trial. Through the organization PAVE (Promoting Awareness, Victim Empowerment) she drew national attention to this travesty of justice:

http://cbs2.com/topstories/local_story_196163730.html
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/07/13/censored.trial.ap/index.html?iref=newssearch
http://www.cbc.ca/radioshows/AS_IT_HAPPENS/20070622.shtml
http://video.msn.com/v/us/fv/msnbc/fv.htm??g=96f5eb09-71fe-46b5-a931-60f08c5da6b5&f=05&fg=rss

(This is but a slice of the media coverage in this case, visit http://pavingtheway.net for all news coverage and updates on this on going legal issue)

The judge's decision to silence the victim on stand was justified as protecting the defendant's right to a fair trial, but what about a victim's rights? The purpose of censored words in trial is to make sure the jury is not biased against the defendant so that he or she can have a fair trial, but what about the bias using consensual words like "sex" will create in the jury against the victim? Jury's need to know that the defendant faces charges of "sexual assault", that the victim went to receive medical treatment from a "sexual assault nurse" and had evidence collected by a "rape kit". None of these things can be known at trial with the censorship, nor most importantly can Ms. Bowen adequately testify to what was done to her.

This struggle for victim's rights is necessary to ensure that future victims may be able to speak the truth on stand and shatter the silence that surrounds sexual violence. For a 10 Step Action Plan to petition to ensure free speech for victim's on the stand visit: http://pavingtheway.net