How come sexual assault is one of hardest crime to prosecute vs every other crime?
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Because you don’t just have to prove that an action occurred (i.e. the two parties had sex or one party touched another party breasts) but also have to prove that the other party did not consent.
Sex and sexual contact are normal parts of society. Its not like robbery where you can simply prove that one party has a stolen watch from a stranger or assault where you simply have to prove that one party hit the other party. You have to prove that the action occurred and the alleged victim did not consent to it.
A common defense will be the defendant claiming that it was consensual. Unless it was recorded or witnessed by a third party, it can be difficult to prove beyond a reasonable doubt which version of events is accurate. Sure, in cases of a home invasion where theres a front door that’s been kicked in, lack of consent can be reasonably inferred. It’s more challenging to prove when two parties go out on a date and go back to one of their places and the next morning one party is saying they had consensual sex that was rough because that’s what the other party said they liked and the other party is claiming they said no and it was rape. If there’s no recording of the sexual act and no independent witness to corroborate one person’s account, its hard to prove who is telling the truth.
And remember that our judicial systems checks and balances are designed to keep innocent people out of jail, not to put guilty people in jail. Which is why in order to get a criminal conviction, you have to unanimously convince a jury of your peers beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused is guilty. If even one out of the twelve jurors isn’t convinced that it happened the way you claim it happened, you get q mistrial.
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