The High Cost of Sexual Assault
From the Ancorage Daily News:
Eight years ago, complaints about charging rape victims for medical exams in Wasilla prompted the Alaska Legislature to pass a bill — signed into law by Knowles — that banned the practice statewide.
“There was one town in Alaska that was charging victims for this, and that was Wasilla,” Knowles said
A May 23, 2000, article in Wasilla’s newspaper, The Frontiersman, noted that Alaska State Troopers and most municipal police agencies regularly pay for such exams, which cost between $300 and $1,200 apiece.
“(But) the Wasilla police department does charge the victims of sexual assault for the tests,” the newspaper reported.
It’s unclear how much Palin personally had to do with the policy, but her appointed police chief objected to its end, and I’m assuming that the mayor of the town could have set a place for it in the budget. However, what’s just as disturbing to me is that the town of Wasilla with its population of 5500 at the time could possible have enough rapes per year to need $14,000 to pay for the exams. That’s possibly 46! Granted the interviewed police chief gives a range of $5,000 to $14,000 and the article says exams cost $300 to $1200, but if you take the mean of both you’re looking at a budget for 12 rapes per year…in a town of 5500. Generally in the US you’re looking at 0.3 rapes per 1000 so in a town of 5500 you’d expect between one and two annually.
Something’s rotten in the town of Wasilla. Damn.
