BEHIND CLOSED DOORS
Teen victims often unwilling to report

LISA BUL/The Patriot Ledger Justin Goldstein, 17, leaves Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham, where he was arraigned May 9 on charges of raping a high school girl.

By Christopher Walker
The Patriot Ledeger

Two days after she was raped in the home of a new boyfriend, the 17-year-old girl willingly detailed the incident for Rockland police.

Sgt. John Llewellyn was sure he had a solid case after only one interview with the teenager: Her clothes would provide useful physical evidence, and her story was convincing.

A few days after that first interview, however, the girl was back in police headquarters. Embarrassed and scared, she no longer wanted to cooperate, and police were left with few options.

“We wanted her to think about it again and tried to show her the error of her ways, but once she made up her mind, that was pretty much the end of it,” Llewellyn said. “At that point, I almost felt like pushing the issue myself just to get the charges filed against the guy, but ethically you can’t do something like that.”

The boy was never arrested.

It’s the same for other police officers and prosecutors. An array of investigative roadblocks often leave them powerless to deal with sexual crimes:

• Experts say the majority of teen rape victims never tell police, making any investigation impossible.
• Victims sometimes change their mind after telling their stories to police and refuse to cooperate.
• Victims often delay reporting by days, weeks, even months, after physical evidence has disappeared.

Police and prosecutors say only a fraction of teen sex crimes result in arrest, and only the most sensational attract public interest.

There has been a rash of such cases recently.

Eight teenagers in Braintree, Canton and Pembroke were charged with rape in three separate cases earlier this year. In all three cases, the teens, most of them high school students, face multiple counts of raping and sexually assaulting female classmates. All three cases are pending in court.

In Winthrop, a group of five boys ages 13 to 15 face sexual assault charges for allegedly groping two teenage girls who were walking from school through a cemetery in March, and in Taunton last month, police say three boys, ages 8, 10, and 12, sexually assaulted a 12-year-old girl in the woods behind their neighborhood.

For every highly publicized case, dozens go unreported, police say.

“(The rape victim) thinks she was doing something wrong, so therefore it was her fault. She missed curfew, she was with a boy who couldn’t be trusted, she was drinking, and she’s afraid other people will say, ‘You dressed seductively, you flirted with him, you sent the wrong messages, you said yes, and then you said no.’’ – Dr. Barbara Green, a clinical psychologist in Hingham who treats teenagers

“I’d think we’d be lucky if we get 25 or 30 percent,” said Whitman Police Detective Sgt. Scott Benton, “but there’s nothing you can do about it if people don’t come forward.”

Without a cooperative victim, prosecuting a rape case is virtually impossible, said Benton and other police officers.

A Patriot Ledger survey of 527 South Shore high school students shows only 3 percent of girls would tell police if they were forced to have sex. Most girls - 70 percent - would tell only a friend.

State crime statistics show teenage girls make up the largest group of rape victims, yet they are the least likely to report the crime.

Rape victims often cite fear, embarrassment and the emotional strain of repeatedly reliving a traumatic incident as reasons for remaining silent, but police say teenage girls face even more pressure to keep quiet about sexual violence.

Many are afraid of self-incrimination or becoming social outcasts.

“(The rape victim) thinks she was doing something wrong, so therefore it was her fault,’’ said Dr. Barbara Green, a clinical psychologist in Hingham who treats teenagers. “She missed curfew, she was with a boy who couldn’t be trusted, she was drinking, and she’s afraid other people will say, ‘You dressed seductively, you flirted with him, you sent the wrong messages, you said yes, and then you said no.’’’

Rather than acknowledge running afoul of household rules, teens choose to let the crime go unreported, police and prosecutors say.

A controlling boyfriend or group of friends can have the same silencing effect on victims. In the small social world of high school, a victim faces the possibility of an everyday encounter with her assailant or her assailant’s friends. While authorities keep the victim’s identity secret, rumors and stories spread quickly through high schools, and teens are inclined to take sides.

Carole Sousa, consultant to the state education department's teen dating violence program, said a rape can divide schools and communities.

“Adults and kids feel like they have to take sides,’’ she said. “Who has the bigger status? Who’s more convincing? Taking sides often means discrediting the victim in school.”

An attitude of self-preservation takes over with victims, said Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy Cruz.. “Whether it’s peer pressure, or parents, these kids sometimes are reluctant to come forward.”

The reluctance persists even in a legal environment that has grown more sensitive to victims:

• Detectives are trained to get what they need for a criminal complaint in a single interview with a victim to avoid repeated, painful retellings of the crime.
• Some investigators say they attempt to build a case so strong, the offender will plead guilty, sparing the victim the ordeal of testifying during a trial.
• Every district attorney’s office has a victim advocate, whose job it is to counsel, reassure and educate rape victims on the process.

“It’s the fear of the unknown, so with the advocates taking them through every step and letting them know what’s going on, it’s a lot easier to understand. It eases the pain,” said Quincy Police Lt. Thomas Malvesti, who heads the department’s community services bureau.

Prosecutors say they find teens’ reluctance to report rape even more frustrating because they know most cases that make it to court will end in conviction.

In Norfolk County last year, 22 of the 29 rape cases adjudicated resulted in convictions. The other seven were either transferred or withheld for possible future prosecution. There were no acquittals.

In Plymouth County, 36 defendants were found guilty, either by trial or plea agreement. Fourteen were acquitted.

“If you have decent physical evidence and an articulate witness, that’s already a very strong case,” said Llewellyn, who is also a lawyer.

Norfolk County District Attorney William Keating said part of the challenge with getting teens to report sexual violence is getting them to recognize what it is.

“I came into this job thinking that this generation of young people would be much more sexually aware than any other generation, especially my own, but that’s just not the case,” said Keating, who conducts frequent education programs on dating and sexual violence at South Shore high schools.

He said there is widespread ignorance among teens about the difference between sexual crimes and sexuality.

The Patriot Ledger survey shows 20 percent of boys believe it’s OK at least some of the time to force a girl to have sex if she and the boy are “going together” and have had sex in the past.

More than 10 percent of boys said it was OK at least some of the time to force a girl to have sex if she was drunk, and close to 15 percent said the same was true if the girl initially consented but then changed her mind.

Teens in the survey were also confused about the state’s statutory rape law, which outlaws sexual intercourse under any circumstances for a person younger than 16.

Only a little more than half of boys and girls in the survey knew the legal age of consent.

Most high schools have programs to address sexual and dating violence, but police and prosecutors say high school is too late. By then, most teens are already well immersed in the sex-oriented popular culture, and may already be sexually active.

Law enforcers say information needs to be given to teens at a younger age, and more often. In Quincy, for example, education about sexual violence starts in the city’s elementary school DARE program and continues through high school.

“It has to be an ongoing educational program. So we give them a little taste in the elementary schools, a little more in middle middle school, and we come back again in the high school,” Malvesti said.

Christopher Walker may be reached at cwalker@ledger.com.

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