Categories
Sexual Assault

Supporting Sexual Assault Prosecutions

Making a Difference Canada is hosting a webinar: Supporting Sexual Assault Prosecutions. It will be offered May 2nd from 1-2pm ET. Click through for more information about the session and other archived educational offerings on their site.

From the site:

This webinar is designed for sexual assault advocacy, support, and education personnel, investigators, medical forensic workers. It will focus on improving the collection of evidence needed to hold sex offenders accountable for their crimes. The webinar will prepare participants to better support prosecution by examining their role in:

  • *Overcoming challenges to victim credibility
  • *Recognizing inappropriate responses and barriers to effective victim interviews
  • *Considering potential defense strategies and ensuring reports include information that can be used to counter them

The prosecution of sexual assaults is a unique undertaking. Unlike all other criminal prosecutions, sexual assault complainants still face the possibility of sexism, bias, myth-based beliefs and criticism in the courtroom and by members of the public. A sexual assault prosecution must always consider the extremely personal nature of the offence against the complainant as they proceed through the Justice system. The Canadian Criminal Code has specific provisions to prevent the mistreatment of the complainant, to protect their privacy and to block the admission of irrelevant personal information about the complainant. Understanding the breadth of these challenges facing a prosecutor is crucial to a sexual assault prosecution.

Also on their site is the archived materials from the earlier webinar, Integrated Response to Sexual Assault (PDF).