Sun, July 10, 2005
Sexual assault: my awful ordeal
Betrayed by a system designed to help victims
By Sue-Ann Levy
IN JUST 45 minutes last summer a 22-year-old stranger turned my life upside down.
The young man, who sold me a bench at a neighbourhood store, came to my condo after work to assemble it. He got part way through. Then he sexually assaulted me.
As I soon discovered, my ordeal merely began with the assault that day. Throughout the next nine months I would feel repeatedly betrayed by the very system designed to help a victim -- by jaded and untrained cops, by a women's support network that did nothing to support me and by an overstretched legal system.
The fallout didn't end there. The store continued to employ my assailant. That left me with two choices: Walk by the store nearly every day on my regular route, or go at least 15 minutes out of my way in order to pursue my daily activities. I elected to go on with my life as best I could.
Nevertheless, it was a rude awakening for someone who'd often reported on the activities of the police and court system. I've even interviewed victims of violence. I soon found out how much I had to learn.
Luckily, the ordeal ended positively two months ago when my assailant pleaded guilty to sexual assault and was subsequently listed on Ontario's sex offenders registry. He did not get jail time, but I did accomplish what I had been told was a longshot: The judge issued an order prohibiting my assailant from being within 1 km of my home. The order means my attacker could no longer work at the job he used to prey on me.
"I think it is paramount that Ms. Levy be able to live in the neighbourhood and wander around in the neighbourhood, go to and from work in the neighbourhood without any fear or trepidation of walking into (the assailant) ... And I think she should know that when she leaves her place that she can walk out into the street and that she is not going to run into him," Mr. Justice John Moore said in his reasons for sentence. "The only way to ensure that that does not happen is to order that (the assailant) not be in the neighbourhood. Whether that results in his losing his job, so be it."
SENSE OF RELIEF
For the first time in months, I now feel a sense of relief when I walk by that store.
Still, there were many times when I wondered why I bothered to call the police at all. Truth is, most women don't. According to Statistics Canada figures, 90% don't report cases of sexual assault, citing fear of the police investigation and the legal system. StatsCan also found that only 4% of cases that end up in court result in a conviction.
I kept thinking that most women -- who might not have the same wonderful support network of friends and contacts as I did -- would feel completely overwhelmed by the system.
"Sadly, I'm not surprised at all," says Jane Doe of my nine-month battle. "We only have to look at police and government statistics to see things haven't changed at all ... rape and sexual assault continue to escalate and women continue not to report."
Doe is the now-famous pseudonym of the Toronto rape victim who successfully sued the city for failing to warn her and others of the threat posed by the "Balcony Rapist," who attacked her in her bedroom in 1986.
Her lawsuit led to a 1999 review by city auditor-general Jeff Griffiths of how the Toronto police handle sexual assaults. Griffiths' scathing report made dozens of recommendations. But in a follow-up audit, released this past January, he found that less than half had ever been adopted by the police.
Doe says the "illusion" that things have changed is "very problematic."
That is why I've chosen to write about my ordeal. I hope by sharing what I've learned, I can help others avoid a similar experience with the system.
I hope this piece will serve as a wake-up call and inspire care providers, court workers, police and government officials to do better for anyone who is sexually assaulted.
My ordeal began innocuously on a Sunday afternoon last August. I did as many other women would do without thinking twice. I offered to pay a young man $25 to assemble the bench I'd just purchased from him at a furniture store called Structube.
He came to my condo after work and did about three-quarters of the assembly before making his move.
As I was preparing dinner in my open-concept kitchen, he indicated he'd made a mistake in putting the bench together. When I went over to look at what he'd done, he began caressing my buttocks.
I retreated in horror into the kitchen and when I next looked out, his penis was out of his pants. He told me he'd felt a "vibe" from me, that he'd always had a fantasy about having sex with an older woman in a condo like mine, and asked if he could kiss me.
I told him absolutely not. But he persisted. When I next looked at him, he was standing in the middle of my living room with his penis fully erect.
I would later write in my victim impact statement that I felt "numb and strangely calm -- as if I was on the sidelines watching a surreal movie playing out in front of me."
Fearing he'd force himself on me, I acted as if nothing was happening and convinced him -- eventually -- to do up his pants, finish the bench and leave. He was so nervous, he damaged the bench.
Once he left, I called a close friend, who insisted I contact police immediately. I hesitated, embarrassed that something like this would happen to me, a journalist.
Eventually, I did contact 52 Division and told my story to the cop on duty. I was told to phone 53 Division. When I reached them, I repeated my story to two duty deskers.
By the time the evening was through, I'd told the story of my assault five times to the police -- including twice more to the first response officers who came to my door. They were sympathetic and well-meaning, but they interviewed me in detail before contacting the Sex Crimes Unit.
I later learned the Toronto Police sex assault protocol stipulates that the first response officers are only to take basic information -- not detailed statements -- and that a supervisory officer is to attend the scene once notified of the sex assault. No supervisor came to my home.
About two hours after interviewing me, one of the first response officers called to advise me how to get in touch with the Police Victim Services unit if I needed to talk to someone.
AFRAID TO STAY AT HOME
I thought I was fine. But I wasn't. I awoke at 3 a.m., panicking and in a sweat. I didn't sleep properly the rest of the night, or for weeks afterward.
I went to work the next day, afraid to remain in my home where the incident occurred. But I had a difficult time concentrating and kept wondering what was happening with my assailant.
I heard nothing from 53 Division until about 3:30 p.m., when the investigating officer assigned to my case phoned to say he had my attacker in custody and wanted to review bail conditions with me. I found out later the police should have offered me the option of being interviewed by a female officer.
I had no idea what I could ask for in terms of bail conditions and later discovered several problems with the forms used. My work address was wrong, and my assailant was ordered not to come within 100 metres of my condo, which didn't take in the Structube store. I could have pushed for a 500-metre limit, a condition I learned about after the fact.
When I came to the station the next afternoon to give my statement on videotape, the recorder didn't work. I was asked to repeat the statement a second time. While I tried to laugh it off at the time, in less than three days I'd told my story eight times to the police -- including once that same day to their Victim Services unit.
A woman from Victim Services followed up with me twice more that first week. When I suggested I might want to seek counselling, she gave me the name of two agencies to contact on my own -- The Barbra Schlifer Commemorative Clinic and the Family Service Association of Toronto. Although police routinely deal with two provincially funded sexual assault centres at Women's College and Scarborough Grace hospitals, she never mentioned them to me, nor did the investigating officer.
Although my assailant had been arrested at the store, Structube never contacted me. After three days, I forced myself to call them to deal with the damaged bench. The manager denied all responsibility, because the assault had taken place after work hours, but she agreed to replace the bench.
During the weeks that followed, I found support would come from the most unexpected people. A few days after the assault, I told city Auditor General Jeff Griffiths over coffee what I'd been through. The full impact hadn't really hit me yet.
Griffiths, whose follow-up audit was then still in progress, said it sounded as though police had broken virtually every rule of Procedure 05-05 in my case (the protocol issued in 2002 by former Police Chief Julian Fantino as a means to ease the reporting of sexual assaults). He asked if he could include examples of where the police didn't comply in his report. I said I didn't mind.
Besides the guidelines already noted, the protocol stipulates the number of times women repeat their interviews to different police officers be kept to a minimum and that regular contact be maintained with a woman who reports an assault.
In the first three days following my assault, it seemed like I was asked to repeat my story to the police non-stop. Yet once I visited 53 Division, I would not hear from the investigating officer again for weeks.
As the days progressed, the trauma started to sink in and I began to feel a depression I'd never experienced before. I decided to get in touch with the Barbra Schlifer clinic, having heard wonderful things about the work they do.
The intake counsellor listened to my story and told me it would take at least a month before a counselling spot would open up. She asked if I could wait. At that the time I thought I could, if it was only a matter of a few weeks.
But that soon changed. The stress of a sudden death in the family, along with the assault, convinced me I couldn't wait.
When numerous messages back and forth to the clinic proved fruitless, a friend of a friend -- a social worker -- helped me get an appointment within a week with a psychiatrist in Toronto General Hospital's Women's Mental Health Unit. Had it not been for the kind and rapid intervention of that social worker, I'm not sure where I would have turned.
Three months later -- in November -- I received a call from the Barbara Schlifer clinic indicating a spot had opened up.
The clinic's executive director Darlene Lawson was apologetic when I called her recently for comment.
The "tragedy," she says, is that the clinic serves 3,000 women a year with information, referrals, legal support, group and individual counselling, and the number of women who call for service has always exceeded their resources. The clinic operated on a $1.9-million budget last year -- including a $28,000 city grant -- which funded 21 staff.
She said the intake worker I spoke with took more than 1,351 calls in 2004 and the clinic saw 361 women for individual counselling. A three-month wait is "not unusual," she said, stressing that's a lot less than other clinics. But she agreed that perhaps I should have been referred to other clinics or agencies.
But the clinic was not the only agency to leave me hanging. During the first week of September, I met the assistant co-ordinator with the provincially mandated Victim/Witness Assistance program assigned to my case. She was to act as an advocate as my case proceeded to a plea or to trial.
I poured my heart out to her that day, never to hear from her again. I found out three months later -- and only after I called, trying to reach her -- that she'd been seconded to another job a few weeks after we'd met.
I was upset that no one had bothered to follow up with me. Even when I called in December, I wasn't told who had been reassigned to my case, nor did the office help me with the victim impact statement I was asked to prepare prior to a January pre-trial conference on the case. I ended up spending four days during my Christmas holidays writing it.
TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE
Tracy Clark, manager of the College Park Victim/Witness Assistance program, told me recently this was "not okay," and apologized. "I'll make sure that won't happen again."
To their credit, the office -- which dealt with 1,400 cases last year -- did set up a meeting with Crown attorney Chris Punter in early January after I pushed for it. And a new case worker did get in touch with me in March, a few days before my case was originally due to go to court.
But it was too little too late. By then, I had done my own homework with help from Doe, some supportive lawyers and my uncle, Jeff Lyons -- who insisted on accompanying me to court.
According to figures from the provincial Attorney General's ministry, the Victim/Witness Assistance program got $13.5 million provincewide last year. Some $389,493 of that went specifically to College Park.
Sexual assault centres across Ontario got $9.6 million last year; $923,210 of which went to the two in Toronto.
Doe says over the years, women's services have been slashed to the bone and as a result, the agencies have suffered in terms of staffing, outreach and advocacy.
"The final result is that there are waiting lists for women who pick up
the phone and ask for rape or crisis intervention counselling," she says.
"We simply don't have enough money to keep up with the demand."
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