Expert offers tips for rape victims

JAKARTA (JP): Advice from a forensic expert: rape victims should immediately see a doctor to have a sample taken of any remaining semen and only then report the crime to the police.

Forensic expert Mun'im Idries said in a seminar on rape held on Tuesday by Kalyanamitra, a non-government organization which campaigns against violence, that sperm, which can be used to prove that a rape has occurred, have a life-span of only five hours.

Therefore, it is better to go to a doctor first before the spermatozoa perish, he said.

"And doctors can later become expert witnesses after the victim has reported to the police," Idries said, adding that, currently, most rape victims go to the police first.

He said sperm could be very useful evidence in rape cases where other proof, such as cuts, bruises or a broken hymen, cannot be found.

He said that it is often difficult for doctors to determine whether a rape has occurred because most victims wash themselves soon after the incident, thereby often losing one an important piece of evidence: the semen.

Idries added that rape continues to be mostly associated with physical violence, whereas in fact alcoholic drinks or drugs can be used also as a medium to rape someone.

Therefore, a blood test revealing the presence of drugs or alcohol can be very helpful in cases where there has been no physical violence, he added.

Meanwhile, noted lawyer Nursyahbani Katjasungkana, who addressed the seminar along with psychologist Sartono Mukadis and photo model Kintan Umari, said Indonesia's rape laws currently discriminate against women.

"Article 285 of the Criminal Codes is very selective. It does not protect women who are raped by their husbands. Therefore, a wife cannot report to the police that she has been raped by her husband," said Nursyahbani.

Article 285 of the Criminal Codes, which has been inherited from Dutch colonial law, states that anyone using violence or force to have sexual intercourse with a woman who is not his legal wife can be charged with rape and is liable to 12 years imprisonment.

She said that the law was the result of an assumption -- based on culture and religious interpretations -- that it is a wife's obligation to serve her husband without question and that a wife is her husband's property, meaning that she does not have the right to refuse.

"Actually all sorts of forced sexual intercourse should be considered as rape," Nursyahbani said.

Nursyahbani's argument was strongly opposed by a participant at the seminar, Judge Hutabarat, who said that the law has been deliberately formulated in such a way as to protect family harmony.

"Just imagine if all wives were given the right to report to the police that they had been raped by their husbands, what would happen to their families? And are you willing enough to reveal your secrets to everybody?" Hutabarat asked.

Nursyahbani said that article 278 of the Criminal Code acknowledges rape has occurred only if there has been physical violence.

"Whereas, in reality, in unbalanced relations like between those who have power and those who don't, such as between a boss and an employee, a teacher and a student, rape cases are also common, although they is no physical violence," she said.

In such cases, women can be forced, usually psychologically, to have sexual intercourse because they don't dare to refuse, she added.(als)