Jennifer Coate of Victoria's Law Reform Commission highlights advances in sexual assault case handling over her career, yet notes a persistent failure of the justice system. Despite improvements around consent discussions and the treatment of victims, statistics reveal that most sexual assault survivors do not report incidents to police. Coate points out the dramatic discrepancies between reported cases and convictions, emphasizing that systemic change is essential for better victim support and accountability for perpetrators, particularly after the impactful #MeToo movement and related activism.
The notion of consent was not discussed, and only victims of stranger rapes were taken seriously... We know without doubt, the vast majority of girls and women who are sexually assaulted will not report to the police.
This was 1992, not 1892... People think this crusty old system hasn't been able to move and change, it's not correct.
The numbers tell the story – Australia's criminal justice system is failing victim-survivors of sexual assault.
According to Victoria's Sentencing Advisory Council, there were 23,000 reports of rape to police between 2010 and 2019 but only 1,000 sentencings for rape offences.
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