Speak the truth for all victims

In America, we have a justice system designed to serve the people and give due process to all parties. Occasionally, people dupe the system to benefit themselves and end up marring the process as a whole. Last week, a woman reported being raped in Assembly Hall during a basketball game and has since recanted her story.\nAccording to Department of Justice statistics and the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, every two minutes, someone in the United States experiences sexual assault, and about a third of those cases are rapes. That statistic alone is frightening enough, but victims of assault have to muster the courage to report the crime and see the investigation through. One woman just made that task even harder.\nAlthough too many men also are sexually assaulted, rape primarily affects women. This local case of a false report will unfortunately plant a tiny seed of doubt in the minds of all those who deal with rape. That inevitable effect of this woman's seeming attempt to escape an inconvenient drinking ticket is shameful and degrading to other women.\nWhile her fake claim of being raped is not going to somehow increase sexual assaults on campus, it contributes to the immense hurdles faced by genuine victims of sexual crimes. The statistics on false rape reports vary. The most- often cited number is 2 percent, but other studies put it as high as 8 percent. But because rape is such an intimate, brutal crime, even a small fraction of fake reports does great damage.\nIf by some awful coincidence the composite sketch of the phantom rapist had resembled someone, and he had been brought in for questioning before the woman retracted her accusation, the reputation of an innocent man would have been jeopardized irreparably. In rape cases, the identity of an adult accuser is kept secret, but a suspect's identity can quickly spread into the public sphere.\nOnly about 40 percent of rapes are ever reported to the police, and the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network uses FBI numbers to estimate that about one in 16 rapists ever does jail time for the crime. Every victim -- whether male or female -- at IU has a duty to report sexual assaults if they happen. Never should one exaggerate or make up stories to get out of a drinking ticket. Every woman owes that much to her community, her mother, her sisters and her classmates, so that when a sexual crime does occur, no one has any reason to be skeptical.\nIt seems she tried to pawn her alcohol citation at the price of other victims' credibility. Lots of people drink at IU, but just a few people failing to accept responsibility for the consequences of their actions can do damage to the legitimate claims of real rape victims. Furthermore, this stunt wasted the resources of IU Police Department and others involved in the case, and created unwarranted fear about other attacks.