when the media writes: WIVB TV Buffalo NY

I have daily Google alert emails for "rape" and "sexual assault". Sadly, not a day goes by when I don't receive both emails.
One of today's stories is about the arraignment of a 17 year old who raped a teenaged store clerk in Buffalo, NY.
I want to focus on a segment of WIVB Channel 4 news report:
NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. (WIVB) - ...Anthony Markel is accused of assaulting and raping a teenaged clerk at Watson's Chocolate Shop in Pine Plaza Niagara Falls. He has also been charged with a predatory sexual assault, a very serious charge.
Um, I'm sorry, is rape not a very serious charge? Let's write this in plain English and be crystal clear about what this man is accused of: rape, assault and predatory sexual assault - which means that he assaulted or threatened her with a weapon. In this case, it was a butcher's knife.
I'm sorry - WTF? Yes, bad things happen every day but why, why don't we spend some money in this country to study the behavior of a 17 year old boy who walks into a store, has his friend be the watch man, picks up a butcher's knife and attacks a young girl?
I have no more words for this one except bail was set at 250,000. Let's watch this one as he is 17 years old. I'm guessing he gets less than 10. Leroy Johnson was 17 when he and his buddy attacked Kelly McGillis and her roommate at knifepoint. He served less than 4 years, went on to attack a few more women, threatened the President, before raping me and my roommate. Please tell me where we are making progress.

What's 440 years in prison?

It's the number of years that each count of sexual assault, home invasion and stalking amounts to in the sentencing of former Bloomington, IL police officer Jeff Pelo. And while it is, by law, the maximum sentence for this rapist, it is also a statement that the Bloomington community is ready to elevate rape as serious as a murder.

Why, you may ask, do some rapists get four years, and others get 40? Contrary to popular belief, it is not their past records (depending on the case and how many years a previous offense was), but the number of charges against them for this case. Think of it as a recipe (as one of my detectives told me): breaking and entering is x number of years, burgulary carries x years, and rape is not just 10, or 5, or 3 years. Sodomy is x years, vaginal penetration is x years, and so on.

I mention this because as horrible and awfully mean it seems, if survivors knew how important remembering each crime is to having the rapist charged for the longest sentence possible, then it might make the process of remembering, documenting, seeking help just a tiny bit easier. Every cell of your being is fighting to protect yourself from remembering, but if there is one fiber that says, if I can say it to someone I could some day be vindicated, it will help. If you can extract yourself from the equation - as many survivors float over their own history and detatch themselves to deal with the pain and death of who they once were - and think that there may be others and that remembering may greatly affect another person's history, that helps too.

I was all about helping other people because it was too painful to remember me. While it wasn't healthy the way I trampled all over myself, I did good work for others and that I can be proud of. I do even better work now that I've owned my history. What has been taken away must be reconstructed - and never pieced back quite the way it was before - because there is no "going back".

The media talks about scars - it's not just scars, it's finding yourself invisible. Homeless. Displaced. And hating yourself along the way, not because you blame yourself (some may), but because you haven't pulled it together. That pressure we put on ourselves is sponsored in part by "real life heroes" on talk shows (not the survivors, the TV producers) and the myths that one you say it, once the rapist is caught, there is an end. There is never an end. The only thing that ended is the life that rapist took away - the "before". And while we don't dwell in the past, it is sometimes necessary to remember it, to own it, and to share it with others.

Kristy Mills and Jonelle Galuska asked that their names be released to the press. Thousands of survivors, including myself, thank you for being so honest and paving the way for other survivors to shed light on what it's really like in that court room - what it means to be able to give an impact statement - what it means to have your voice heard. Because my case was based on DNA evidence, I could not go public. And if you go back in my blog, you will find my livid posts about the rapist being in the papers every day - while I had to do what goes against everything I am as a survivor - I had to be silent.

No- sentencing is not a day of celebration, it doesn't heal or make the rape go away, but it gets the rapist off the street and protects the rest of us from potentially being their next victim. Because there always is.

Jane Doe Rape Kits

A rape kit: simple, right?


Starting next year, federal law will require hospitals and clinics to provide rape survivors with the option of collecting a "Jane Doe Rape Kit", meaning you can have kit performed without involving the police at that very moment. Or ever. An anonymous rape kit that marks the kit with a number rather than your name.

Already people are yammering over women using the kit as a way to threaten men they've had sex with. Have you ever had a rape kit performed? It takes over a hour and is as intrusive as it gets. Plus the 8 hour wait at the ER will have women flocking to the ER just to falsely accuse a guy. Please.

At first read, I thought "Why on earth has this not been available earlier? Well it has but certainly not everywhere. Funding they say is an issue. Perhaps we take some money away studying erectile dysfuction or prescribing rapists Viagra and you may have some leftover change? Just a thought.

Imagine this: you've been raped, you want to get help but the attacker could be following you. You could live with the attacker. And so on. So you make it to the hospital and wait in the ER for four, maybe five hours only to wait in a sterile exam room for another hour or so. Your mind wanders - you're numb, you're scared out of your mind - you don't wan't to be there . The last thing you want is for someone to touch your body and not only do they have to take your blood pressure, they have to touch you every place you've just been violated. It's devastating. And then, while you are sitting in nothing but a paper gown, the police come. Not one but probably two or three. Don't count on a woman and if it happens to be a woman, don't expect them to be more sensitive. Some officers are, some aren't. They try - they are just doing their job and their job is to catch the perp. So then you're telling the story, and then you have to tell it again, and eventually after 6 or 7 hours, you'll put your clothes back on, ride in the back of a police car and tell it all over again at the precinct. It is necessary. I wouldn't have done it any other way but I am a survivor of a stranger rape - if it were someone I knew, getting a rape kit performed and pressing charges in a hospital gown - that would be incredibly hard.

If a Jane Doe Rape Kit gets more women the medical attention they need AND allows them to get a rape kit performed without having the police involved, sometimes literally in your exam room? Yes, there will be more rape kits. Just like calling a hotline - you get the care you need, anonymously.

This is an enormous opportunity for both survivors and the police. Considering that only 41 percent of survivors report their cases, I'd say, yeah, making something easier would be helpful.

I'll comment on how the media covered this item later. If I read "too ashamed" one more time I'm going to freak out.

No holiday spirt for Tennessee sex offenders

photo coutesy of Getty Images

Here are the "Tennessee Rules" for sex offenders on Halloween, issued by the State of Tennessee Board of Probation and Parole.
State law mandates the following for sex offenders:
-Do not answer the door to trick-or-treaters
-No passing out of candy to children
-No holiday decorations on homes
-No visits to haunted houses, corn mazes, hay rides or other seasonal activities
-Do not attend any party where children are gathered
-No costumes
-No trick-or-treating

Is this really effective law making, or our we just scaring the bejesus out of our children? How about prison sentences that are in keeping with Class A Crimes (that would mean a minimum of 25 years in jail)? Sounds a lot safer (and saner) than not allowing rapists to trick or treat.
Does anyone believe that our children are safer by ostracizing sex offenders within our own communities? Building communities, even islands, for sex offenders to live? And is anyone, please, at any point and time, going to make a distinction between rapists who prey on children and those who prey on others: serial rapists typically have a MO and those who rape young women may never assault a child. The difference is important for us all to be acutely aware of.

I don't want sex offenders locked down for Halloween; I'd prefer them to be locked up in prison. I'm sure there's a lot of trick or treating going on in there.