On Tuesday, the Public Relations Department of the Guyana Police Force (GPF) issued a statement in which it sought to defend Commander of ‘A’ Division Clifton Hicken who has been justly lambasted for his suggestion that if young women’s attire was “accepted morally”, they could avoid being raped.
What Mr Hicken said, among other things, was: “You know, we’re speaking of preventing somebody from committing an offence and yet we are creating an atmosphere in terms of our society…
“When we are within our partnership programmes we advocate for the young females who seem to be vulnerable in a certain age group—that moving from around 13 to 18, 16 to 18—and we always try to embrace an attire that would be accepted morally.”
Following the publication of Mr Hicken’s remarks as well as some of the responses to it on Tuesday, the GPF quickly issued a statement in which it advised the public that “the Police Divisional Commander of ‘A’ Division has been taken out of context. The Divisional Commander had no intention to, in any way, justify sexual assaults.”
Mr Hicken’s remarks were made during the release of crime statistics, which the GPF does regularly. There was a marked increase in the reporting of rape. According to police statistics, 50 women reported being raped between January 1 and November 10, 2014 and this was a 31.5% increase over the corresponding period last year, when 38 women reported rape. It was in this context that Mr Hicken spoke. He prefaced his morally acceptable attire remark, with the words that society was “creating an atmosphere”, while speaking of preventing rape.
According to the GPF’s statement, while men should not interpret women’s attire as sending “a particular type of signal… it is happening to some degree.”
The release goes on to say that information from interviews of suspects in sexual assault matters and intelligence from discussions among elements of criminal groups, which have been infiltrated suggested that “the mode of dress of the victims may have contributed to the suspects’ selection of targets.” That being the case, Mr Hicken felt “obligated to share that information as one of his crime prevention strategies focusing on sexual assault,” the release added.
What the GPF is saying in effect is that we should all be grateful to Mr Hicken—women especially—for revealing this new and vital information, since it was shared with rape prevention in mind. Women should perhaps be thanking Mr Hicken for his sage advice, which will no doubt lead to fewer rape reports.
But here’s the thing: what the GPF and Mr Hicken failed to take cognizance of is the fact that rapists are deviants whose crimes are not triggered by skimpy attire. Rapists assault women, men and children whom they perceive to be vulnerable regardless of what they are wearing. Rape is also a crime of dominance, wherein the attacker seeks to achieve/assert power over his/her victim. If, in fact, the GPF is aware of “elements in criminal groups” who are targeting certain young women, then that information should have been publicly disseminated as soon as it was verified. That it failed to do so does not say much of its crime prevention efforts.
It is a well-known fact that the GPF has an extremely poor record where the investigation and successful prosecution of rape is concerned. It is also a fact that many women who are raped choose not to go to the police because they fear the stigmatization which follows and because they are not confident that their reports will be handled correctly or that they will receive justice.
What Mr Hicken and the GPF also failed to take into consideration is that an increase in the number of rapes reported this year does not necessarily translate to an increase in rapes. The fact that there is more support in the form of groups like Red Thread, Citizens Against Rape and the Guyana Women Miners Organisation would obviously see more women having the courage to come forward. What the police ought to be doing is capitalizing on this by conducting proper investigations to ensure that sufficient and strong evidence is gathered to successfully prosecute these beastly crimes. And this is what Mr Hicken ought to have addressed, since as a police officer he should know that judicious sentencing follows successful prosecutions and deters crime.
It is not within the mandate of Mr Hicken or any police divisional commander, however well meaning, to lecture women on their mode of dress, especially given the fact that the GPF itself is no beacon of morality. The Guyana Police Force needs to work not only on its investigating, evidence gathering and preservation skills, but on its sensitization and PR as well.
