Jessica

Vozel

Read Jessica's bio and previous columns here

November 19, 2007

Cincinnati Rape Case: Another Blame-the-Victim Travesty

Near my residence in Cincinnati, Ohio, just off the exit ramp for I-71, a woman was recently raped by a homeless man with HIV. A passing motorist observed something not quite right occurring on the side of the road and called the police. When the authorities arrived, they said it was obvious to them that the woman, a 23-year-old student at the University of Cincinnati, was sleeping, and in fact, had been sleepwalking. The perpetrator’s public defender is seizing on this information and is building a defense around it.

According to the defense lawyer, Jeff Adams, "It goes to consent. How is he to know she is sleepwalking, if it's a dream ‘yes’ or a real ‘yes’?” He did not indicate whether or not she actually did give consent in the midst of her sleepwalking trance.

While Mr. Adams is obviously doing what is required of him by finding a loose thread that could be pulled to his client’s advantage, it’s a sad state of affairs when an incapacitated individual can be raped in her sleep and an actual defense can be mounted and considered credible. Likely she – rather than the alleged rapist, Dexter Ford – will have to convince the courts of her innocence in this situation.

According to the witness, Dexter Ford was lying on top of the woman, holding her down with his body weight. She was not moving. It seemed obvious to the motorist that she was being attacked, and according to the police who arrived on the scene, it was also evident that she was not conscious. Therefore, it’s difficult to understand how Ford was not aware of the condition the young woman was in. 

Additionally, Ford has a criminal history with charges ranging from breaking and entering to drug offenses. He also has a medical history of schizophrenia and has spent time in mental institutions. It seems to me, then, that it would be more logical, and more ethical, for Mr. Adams to defend his client on the basis of his documented mental instability, as opposed to blaming the victim because of a sleepwalking condition. His mental problems could explain why he did not recognize the young woman to be asleep, so it would seem logical that it would be this fact that the defense would choose to use. 

Because of the defense being mounted against her, the young woman will now have to deal with a three-fold problem: Not only will she have to struggle psychologically to get over the rape itself and deal with the possibility that she has been infected by HIV, but she will now also have to withstand a trial that tells her that what happened was not a violation because she consented to it. 

Blaming the victim in cases such as this is not a new phenomenon. Women who report rapes often have to prepare themselves to be questioned in the courtroom by defense attorneys about what they were wearing, how much they had to drink, if they were walking alone, and other details that seem to point to some responsibility in the rape. With such facts, it is not surprising that for every rape that is reported, there are 10 that aren’t.

When the maelstrom surrounding the Duke Lacrosse rape case was at its most volatile, I was concerned about the effect on future rape victims. Would those who had observed the woman who falsely reported rape being slammed by the media be more reluctant to come forward? What the female accuser did to the young men who were put on trial was unacceptable, and it’s unfortunate that perhaps the most visible rape case of the decade was based on false accusations.

The tendency to blame the victim in the case of rape is a pervasive problem that inhibits women from coming forward with the crimes committed against them. It would seem to me that a more logical and ethical defense would be to point to a flaw within the individual committing the crime, such as in this case, and spare the victims additional psychological trauma.

© 2007 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.

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