> Reclaim the Night > Messages
Message froma Survivor
Retrospective use of rapist's DNA
c Melina Magdalena
www.mersigns.blogspot.com
12 Jun 2006
First of all, this person who was raped is not a
victim of rape. She's a survivor. Moreover, I would like to acknowledge her
courage, in reporting the crime to the police. That is not an easy thing to do,
and I wish her strength in the journey ahead.
Secondly, it's bad enough to be raped by someone who is known to you. If it's
not someone you live with, you're always going to be on tenterhooks, afraid to
run into him somewhere unexpectedly, and you wonder who in your social circle
knows about him and hasn't said anything. That's pretty creepy.
But when you're raped by a stranger, one of the first questions you ask is ?why
me? To have such a personal violation, this atrocity committed against you, and
then you say ? it can't have been a random attack. It's so pointless. And after
that, you realise that every man is suspect. It could have been the policeman
who is interviewing you. It could be the man in front of you at the supermarket
checkout. It could be your nephew, your uncle's best friend, your neighbour,
your grandson's teacher, your mechanic.
So you walk around with this burden of knowing that you are a damaged, violated,
broken person. And you know it can happen again, at any moment. Who was it? No
one knows. But that rapist knows you now. And he might come back. You might
encounter him anywhere and he'll be laughing about it, because you're so
terrified. There's no way to prevent it from happening again. There is no such
thing as personal safety. You are vulnerable to attack at every minute of every
day. You wind yourself up as tight as a spring and you're ready to be raped
again.
After a long time, you get used to being on edge all the time. You live with the
fatigue of spending all your energy keeping guard and you modify the way you do
things, to try and feel a little bit safer. You worry about the people you love,
and hope they never go through what you've gone through and you live with the
constant regret that those who are closest have seen you at your worst, and you
wonder how it's affected them. And you get on with your life, because what else
can you do? It's either that, or give up and die. But you never forget that you
are under siege.
I was raped thirteen years ago when a stranger broke into my home while I was
asleep. Even now, after all this time, I do not go to sleep ever, without
running through scenarios in my mind. If it happens again tonight, what will I
do? Is the phone beside my bed? Do I have a clear escape route? Is there
anything nearby that he could hit me or cut me or strangle me with? Have I
checked the doors and windows? What will happen to the children if I am murdered
tonight? Have I done absolutely everything I can to make sure they will be all
right even if I am not?
Thirdly, this business of DNA testing is being twisted to a criminal's
advantage, by conveniently forgetting the purpose for which his DNA was taken
and tested in the first place. Police DNA records should be no more sacrosanct
than fingerprints. The whole point of a DNA Bank is to assist police to solve
crimes, prosecute offenders, and stop further offences from being committed.
If your fingerprints are on file, it is a good deterrent not to commit a crime
that might be linked back to the reason your fingerprints were taken in the
first place. The same follows for DNA testing. No one is advocating that every
person in Australia have their DNA arbitrarily put into the DNA Bank just in
case they commit a crime down the track.
If the police have this rapist's DNA on file, we may presume they took it for
some other offence-related purpose. When a person is not convicted for a crime
because of lack of evidence, it doesn't mean that person didn't commit the
crime. But saying that his DNA cannot subsequently be used to identify a crime
that he did commit because he didn't commit the other one, is a bit like saying
'OK, you got off, that time so feel free to go out and re-offend.? Wouldn't it
be more sensible to say 'You were lucky that time, you bastard, and we'll be
watching you, so keep your nose clean! If you hurt anyone else, we will be on to
you in a flash, because that kind of behaviour is unacceptable and we will not
tolerate it.'
c Melina Magdalena
www.mersigns.blogspot.com