BITTER JUSTICE

Jury trials for rape can be traumatic for victims, and have low conviction rates. But are calls for judge-only trials warranted?

- SALLY BLUNDELL

Sorry. Sorry for not remembering, sorry for crying. Sorry for not understanding the often-archaic language of the courtroom. Again and again, in transcripts from adult rape trials in New Zealand court-rooms, the complainant apologises. “It is common, especially if people get upset or they don’t understand,” says Elisabeth McDonald, an adjunct law professor at the University of Canterbury, who researches sexual and family violence law and has conducted studies on rape trials. “Being challenged about inconsistencies in your account – it’s about your sense of self and you are so vulnerable.”

The criminal justice system has long been recognised as a difficult space for victims of sexual violence. The cross-examinations, the pressure to remember meticulous details, to recount distressing events over and over again, to have any chinks in your credibility excavated for forensic inspection – even when you’re behind a screen or CCTV camera, it is bruising.

“There is the ‘not knowing’ part of the process,” says Christine Thomas, crisis co-ordinator for the ÅŒtepoti Collective Against Sexual Abuse, or ÅŒcasa (formerly Rape Crisis Dunedin). “Will people believe me? Will the offender plead guilty? Will there be any repercussions for speaking up? Will I upset my family? Will I have to see the person who hurt me? A lot of the anxiety occurs in the lead-up to the trial, which can take upward of two years. The constant delays make matters worse and mean that survivors are constantly having to recalibrate their psyche to get their head around the delays.”