Lyon Thomas D, Stolzenberg Stacia N, McWilliams Kelly
1 University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
2 Arizona State University, Phoenix, AZ, USA.
J Interpers Violence. 2017 Mar;32(6):805-825. doi: 10.1177/0886260516657355.
Ross Cheit's book The Witch-Hunt Narrative highlights the difficulties of prosecuting child sexual abuse. Drawing examples from a single case, Alex A., we examine the ways in which false acquittals of sexual abuse are likely to occur. First, prosecutors tend to question children in ways that undermine their productivity and credibility. Second, prosecutors have difficulty in explaining to juries the dynamics of sexual abuse and disclosure, making children's acquiescence to abuse and their failure to disclose when abuse first occurs incredible. Third, attorneys undermine children's credibility by pushing them to provide difficult to estimate temporal and numerical information. A post-script to the Alex A. case illustrates the costs of wrongful acquittals.
罗斯·蔡特的《猎巫叙事》一书强调了起诉儿童性虐待案件的困难。我们以一个单一案例“亚历克斯·A.”为例，研究了性虐待案件中可能出现错误无罪判决的方式。首先，检察官询问儿童的方式往往会削弱他们的陈述能力和可信度。其次，检察官难以向陪审团解释性虐待和披露的动态过程，使得儿童对虐待行为的默认以及在虐待首次发生时未披露的情况令人难以置信。第三，律师通过促使儿童提供难以估计的时间和数字信息来削弱他们的可信度。“亚历克斯·A.”案的后记说明了错误无罪判决的代价。
