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TW: sexual violence & reporting
In 2014, a serial rapist/fellow college student raped me. I don’t want to go into details (but feel free to google if you are curious). I escaped around 12 pm onto a street full of people. I was pretty incoherent, but someone told me to call 911.
In 2014, a serial rapist/fellow college student raped me. I don’t want to go into details (but feel free to google if you are curious). I escaped around 12 pm onto a street full of people. I was pretty incoherent, but someone told me to call 911.
I hadn’t necessarily had fun experiences with law enforcement before (which is maybe expected, given my teenage activities). But I never would’ve predicted that I would be treated badly as a crime victim. Almost as soon as I was in the back of the ambulance, things went sideways.
I was uncomfortable being alone with two men. I asked for a female officer, and was told no. I asked if my friends could come sit with me, and I was told no again. I said I should call my mom, and one officer told me “this is pretty embarrassing for you, you can call her later”
I was asked “what did you say to this boy to make him know he was raping you?” I said “I told him to stop, I said please let me go, please don’t”. The officer: “well, it doesn’t sound like you said the word ‘no’ - boys really understand the word no. You should try that next time”
At the hospital, the detective interviewing me seemed.... bored? Agitated? Not interested in what I had to say? He kept interrupting me, and he started the interview by saying “just so you know, this isn’t gonna go anywhere”
After a forensic nurse examined me and found over a hundred injuries, the detective’s response to her was “well, kids are into kinky shit these days”. She internally reported him for this, but he was soon promoted anyways and never faced serious consequences as far as I know.
Then, my rapist’s friends told the detective that they had a recording of me describing things as consensual/admitting that I lied. Despite the fact that this recording didn’t exist, the detective then released my rapist & implied that he would charge me for filing a false report
This is a pretty terrible story, right? Despite the fact that I speak openly about it now, it was still hard to type these anecdotes out (and it’s not even the full story). No matter how much time has passed, that experience honestly haunts me.
Well, today I have an update. An update I knew I couldn’t share without sharing all of the above. The police department I’m talking about is the Minneapolis Police Department. I’m far from the only person who has had an experience similar to this when reporting to MPD.
Today, I was invited by the new Chief at MPD to share that story at a press conference announcing changes to their sexual assault investigation policy. I won’t say this will be perfect. But if I could go back and tell my 19 year old self that someday, fighting would be worth it -
It’s hard to describe. The amount of hostility I originally received for speaking out was immense. So to be able to actually stand next to an officer from that same department, and listen to them describe how they want to do things differently - it feels enormously gratifying
Anyways, that ended up being super long - but long story short, I have sacrificed a lot since I came forward. I’ve had a lot of moments where I’ve wanted to give up. But to finally make progress here is everything, and I want to pass along encouragement if you, too, are fighting
I have to add this here: I am ecstatic about this. This bill has been in the works since 2016, and it passed the House finally! It would establish a grant program for law enforcement to both receive trauma informed training and report back their results:
