Obsession (24 page)

Although the raw emotions exhibited by expressive types make some investigators uncomfortable, guarded types are more difficult for most investigators, some of whom interpret silence as withholding information or details. In fact, this is often an attempt on the victim’s part to maintain control of herself after an event in which control has been completely taken away.

And just as the rape victim often feels she’s lost control of her life, the crime can reach out and affect the very relationships she’ll need to get through her ordeal, compromising her ability to resume a “normal life” further. As Burgess and my FBI Academy colleague Roy Hazelwood write in their book,
Practical Aspects of Rape Investigation: A Multidisciplinary Approach
, “Rape can precipitate a crisis not only for the victim, but for family, friend and others in her network. Police officers and attorneys very likely will have to deal with these family members and some understanding of the impact the rape has on their lives
may help to create a more cooperative victim and partner.”

The issues for victims and the people emotionally close to them can become complex and problematic. Does a husband or lover view the victim as an individual he loves who has been badly hurt and is still suffering, or as an extension of himself—a “possession” that has now lost some of its value? Does he view the rape as something that happened to the victim, or does he feel she somehow brought it on herself? Does he blame the assailant for doing this terrible thing to her or himself for not being able to protect her or stop it? How will they deal with the ordeal of the investigation and the trial, particularly if it is at all publicized?

Many men will feel as if they themselves have been victims, and in some ways they are. I’ve often said that each violent crime has a long string of victims. But they must not forget who the primary victim is. A man might feel that the woman should have fought harder or resisted more intensively, and it’s important to deal with this particular notion right away. Any woman who emerges from a sexual attack alive should be recognized for her courage and resourcefulness, and no one should ever second-guess her tactics in handling the crisis. What any of us might think with the luxury of twenty-twenty hindsight—and from the safe distance of one who was not there, facing a determined assailant—is meaningless except in terms of how it helps us to deal with the next one. The critical thing is that she survived, and that is something she accomplished on her own.

When a man questions the way his wife or girlfriend handled the assault, it may be a symptom of his own embarrassment or helplessness or guilt in the situation. Another manifestation of embarrassment or emotional confusion is to lose physical desire for the woman,
another circumstance that may require immediate counseling.

A more positive response is when the victim’s partner wants to “get the guy who did it.” This can be one of the healthier attitudes we see because it may encourage the woman to report the crime. On the other hand, if she had been hesitant and just does so because of his urging, without coming to grips with her own emotional issues, the relationship can be made more difficult and filled with trauma.

These problems are not merely limited to “traditional” sexual assaults. Burgess and Hazelwood cite the case of a homosexual rape of a man whose wife felt he should have been able to fend off the attack, and of a woman whose lesbian partner was hurt and angry that she had had sex with a man, even though it was against her will.

Any of these reactions can obviously hamper a victim’s ability to rebound emotionally from her assault—a process that may be already complicated by recovery from sometimes severe physical injuries. But here’s one thing upon which virtually all the experts agree: that the more support the victim gets from those close to her, the smoother or easier her recovery. The problems arise when people have unrealistic expectations or may project their own needs over those of the victim’s.

A husband may express his frustration that his wife hasn’t “gotten over it” yet. I’ve seen the same thing happen many times to the families of murder victims. Well meaning but ignorant and insensitive friends, relatives or even casual acquaintances and total strangers counsel that they will not “feel better” or “have closure,” or whatever, until they can put this horrible event behind them and “get on with their lives.” Pardon me, but this is a load of crap. Time will make the pain less acute, but telling a victim or survivor to get
on with his or her life is the same as questioning the value of the murdered loved one or—in the case of rape—her life before the attack.

Well-intentioned though he may be, and with her best interests at heart, the husband may now be ready for her to have more good days than bad, not be fearful in strange situations or when left alone, and to show more interest and vigor in making love to him. But it’s a vicious circle: the more pressure he puts on her, the harder it will be for her to come to grips with what’s happened to her. Just like the survivors of other violent crimes, rape victims go through a grieving process, missing the more carefree life they’ve lost. And again like survivors of other crimes, everyone grieves in different ways and at different paces. It is completely insensitive for anyone to set what he or she believes is a reasonable time frame for someone else’s recovery. Like veterans of a war, survivors of sexual assault run the gamut from those who adapt fairly well quickly to others who suffer long-term physical and emotional symptoms recognized as part of the larger rape trauma syndrome.

We shouldn’t lose sight of the good news, though, which is that many victims of sexual assault do fully “recover.” This is not to suggest that they ever forget what happened to them, any more than the murder victim’s survivor ever removes that person from the heart, but they are able to put it behind them enough to function normally again and accomplish what they want in their lives. Like getting out of the assault alive, recovery is a process that calls on all the resources and courage a survivor has, and this should be recognized by those she counts on to support her over the short and long term.

Investigators, prosecutors, jurors, and the rest of us also have to understand that rape victims in the immediate aftermath of the crisis may not react with all of
their normal faculties. If you’ve ever suffered a life-altering trauma—the sudden death of a loved one, a serious and/or physically debilitating automobile accident—then you know that it takes a while for your head to clear and your heartbeat to return to normal. And there may always be things that make you start, that trigger an actual physical reaction, as long as years after the event. For a rape victim, this temporary disconnect from normal processing capabilities can lead to delays in reporting, which can ultimately affect a successful prosecution.

What we recommend when a victim does come forward after some delay is not to berate her for not reporting it right away, telling her what a problem this is going to be, but to have the investigator get her to explain what it was that finally allowed her to reach this point and make the difficult decision to report. This tells you a lot about where the victim is coming from and makes her a better witness later on.

One of the things we cannot stress enough is the importance of having specially trained and experienced, professional law enforcement personnel involved, who employ established standard methods of information and evidence gathering. Physical evidence has been lost by untrained officers and crime-scene technicians who, in a laudable and understandable effort to be sympathetic to the victim, allow her to change clothing or wash herself before giving a statement or going to the hospital—or even offer a good stiff drink to help calm the nerves of a victim of an oral sexual assault! If there is no semen on the victim or elsewhere at the scene, an inexperienced investigator may think this means there was no sexual assault, that the victim is not being truthful, particularly if she reports having been raped several times over the course of the attack. But as we’ve noted, difficulty or failure to ejaculate is not uncommon among rapists,
and it’s a detail that might actually give us information to go on in our investigation.

This is what I always make a point of to investigators: In addition to getting a physical description of the rapist, what he was wearing, any disguise, any weapon he might have carried or other implement he brought with him, the type of car he drove, etc., etc., it is vitally important to assimilate as much information on his
behavior
as possible. What did he say during the attack? What, if anything, did he make his victim say during the attack? How did he attempt to control her? What did he do to her physically? What did he do to her—or force her to do to him—sexually, and what was the order of sexual acts? How long did he take? What was his demeanor? Many law enforcement agencies find it useful to rely on queries like those in the questionnaire Roy Hazelwood designed when we were both working at Quantico. These more specific questions elicit the type of behavioral information we need to develop a useful profile of the unknown rapist. Specially trained and sympathetic law enforcement personnel will know how to ask these types of questions. I liken it to the process I use in profiling offenders, when I evaluate the crime scene from the victim’s perspective. The interviewer, too, needs to “walk in the shoes of the victim,” do some victimology, and understand how to relate to her.

To give an idea of how important this can be, some victims may not know or recognize the proper terminology for different types of sexual assault and may inadvertently provide incorrect information. You can’t automatically assume
sodomy
means the same thing to everyone, or that everyone has even heard the word before. A skilled interviewer will recognize how to phrase questions and will similarly know to clarify when colloquialisms are used to make sure the information gathered is accurate. Elderly victims may not
know how to describe what happened to them or may be too embarrassed to admit certain sex acts occurred, simply because “in their day” people didn’t have oral sex and it is seen as perverted and humiliating, for example. At every step, the interviewer needs to make sure the victim understands why the question is being asked, and why a complete answer, however discomforting, is so important.

Even though it is painful for the victim to relive the experience in such detail, a thorough interview may actually prove therapeutic. First off, through simple actions such as asking the victim if she’d like to be addressed as Ms. So-and-so, rather than immediately using the more familiar first name, the interviewer gives the victim some control over her situation. A skilled interviewer will balance the emotional needs of the victim with the need to gather pertinent information and will be able to work toward a more comfortable outcome for her. And by making the victimized woman a “partner” in the process, we not only get more useful information for our investigation, but we may help her regain some of the control over her life that was taken from her in the assault—she can help us nail the guy who did this to her.

A sensitive but critical issue is convincing the victim to get proper medical attention. This is important both for her own health and the “health” of the case. Fairstein says, “Whether or not she decides to finish formal reporting at that point is less important than documenting what’s in and on her body immediately, because you can’t go back and retrieve that.”

After this consideration, Fairstein continues, “You have to make sure she can get the accurate answers about what the process involves for her. How many times will she have to tell her story? Who will she have to see? Do her parents or her husband or her children have to be told about what happened? Is the
guy likely to be found? Whether it’s an acquaintance or a stranger rape, how much about her personal history is going to be explored in the case? Most of these things are questions that can be answered at the time she first comes into contact with a police officer. It’s bigger than any victim can deal with in the first moments after the attack, and there are ways to help her through it that the police officer who responds has to be able to deal with.”

While the investigator needs to be sensitive to the victim’s physical and emotional welfare, keeping in mind that his or her behavior is largely going to affect not only the disposition of the case but the woman’s overall mental health, this is equally true of medical professionals. As strange as it may be for a profession that seems to have a specialty for everything, only recently have medical personnel been trained specifically to handle sexual assault—that is, how to treat the emotional and physical problems of the victim while at the same time effectively gathering and preserving crucial evidence. This is one area where we have seen improvement, though, as standard kits have been developed (and used more universally) to gather evidence of sexual assault.

And there are many complicated issues here, too. What is the legal definition of rape operative in the particular jurisdiction? Is the emergency room physician required as a matter of law to report to the police any injuries consistent with the crime of rape, or does he need the written consent of the patient to do so? How should the medical records reflect the physical condition of the patient without reaching conclusions that should be left to a jury?

A victim in an emergency room may have to tell her story several times to several different types of people, after she’s already told the first investigating officers, which may greatly upset her and make her
feel even more victimized. Like the police officer with his side of the case, before the physical exam takes place, the doctor or nurse should explain everything that is to be done, so the patient won’t feel even more vulnerable and out of control. This is especially true for any part of the exam that may be physically uncomfortable, since she may already be in considerable pain. Depending on the age of the victim and her level of sexual experience, this may be the first gynecological exam she’s ever had—a procedure that can be frightening enough when done on an elective basis in a considerably less fragile and battered emotional and physical state.