Introduction | Kate's story | Jessica's story | Amanda's story | Jane's story | Closing

Editor’s Note: The names of three of the victims and all of the assailants in this story have been changed to protect the privacy of the women who shared their stories. Amanda said she was comfortable using her name in the story.

Kate awakens to the sharp pain of an IV needle inserted in her left arm. She opens her eyes to a room in Lawrence Memorial Hospital.

Why am I here? Alcohol poisoning?

She doesn’t remember drinking that much, but she does remember she has a test in two hours.

I have to get out of here.

Before she can unhook her IV, a nurse and police officer enter the room. “Do you remember anything from last night?” they ask.

Nothing.

A short pause, the nurse’s and police officer’s eyes meet and turn back to Kate.

“We think you have been sexually assaulted,” the nurse says. She suggests Kate have a rape kit

and blood tests done.

Kate doesn’t comprehend what she’s hearing, but she feels her throbbing head and churning stomach and thinks she might vomit.

Confused and traumatized, Kate declines to stay for a rape kit, and instead goes home to shower and sleep.

Kate, a KU sophomore, had joined the one of every four undergraduate women at U.S. colleges who have been victims of sexual assault, according to a 2000 National Institute of Justice Report. The same report found that women who drank enough alcohol to get drunk had a higher risk of being victimized sexually. The American Academy of Pediatrics calls alcohol the “most common date-rape drug.” It makes women more vulnerable to an assault, less able to resist an assailant and impairs their judgment afterward when they make critical decisions about reporting to police and preserving evidence.

But no amount of excessive drinking ever justifies a sexual assault. Annie McKay, former assistant director of the Emily Taylor Women’s Resource Center, who specializes in sexual violence prevention services, said it was wrong to blame victims for the crimes against them by pointing to their behavior.

“We have long been conditioned to say, ‘Well, I guess I shouldn’t have looked like that,’ or, ‘Had I made better choices, I wouldn’t have been raped,’” she said. “But you can make every right decision and still be sexually assaulted.”

The decision to report a sexual assault is not easy. Victims face a barrage of invasive tests and a legal system that requires them to retell in detail and relive their humiliating attack before police officers, nurses, doctors, prosecutors, psychiatrists, and, for the select few whose cases make it to court, a judge and jury.

A lack of eyewitnesses other than victims in most rapes makes rape the most difficult crime to prosecute, especially if victims don’t call police quickly or allow for the gathering of biological evidence, Amy McGowan, assistant Douglas County district attorney, said. McGowan was a Jackson County, Mo., prosecutor for 17 years and has worked in her current position for five years.

Because many sex crime cases lack physical evidence, such as an attacker’s DNA left behind in sperm, to corroborate a victim’s testimony, McGowan said her office prosecuted only about one of every four cases. The district attorney’s office prosecutes only when it knows it has sufficient evidence to prove a defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Otherwise, the victim might be dragged through a painful and futile process in search for justice the legal system couldn’t provide.

“I look at every case as, ‘Can I prove this to a jury?’” McGowan said. “It’s tough — the majority of cases I can’t file.”

Introduction | Kate's story | Jessica's story | Amanda's story | Jane's story | Closing

— Edited by Brandy Entsminger