A woman in England has filed a rape lawsuit after experts claimed she may be suffering from a rare sleep disorder known as sexual sleepwalking.
Jade McCrossen-Nethercott’s rape case was dismissed by the Crown Prosecution (British prosecutor known as CPS) over allegations she had an episode of a rare disorder also known as “sexsomnia”. Because of this claim, the CPS no longer believed it could secure a conviction.
But Jade objected to the decision for months. CPS now admits that not prosecuting the case was wrong and has apologized to him. But the law prevents his case from being reopened and he will no longer have a chance to seek justice.
But what went wrong? The BBC followed Jade’s case for months.
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One Sunday night in the spring of 2017, Jade woke up on a sofa in a South London flat to discover she was half-naked.
The 24-year-old woman reported intense puncture sensations and suspected she had been raped in her sleep.
Three years later – and a few days before the man accused of raping her would go on trial – CPS lawyers summoned her to an emergency meeting at a police station.
His case was shelved before trial. The CPS attorney explained that two sleep experts have given their views on his case. They said that Jade may have had an episode of sexual sleepwalking and may appear alert and consenting.
“Sexsomnia,” or sexual sleepwalking, is a medically recognized sleep disorder. People with this condition engage in sexual acts while they sleep.
Laws in England and Wales consider that a person does not consent to have sex while they sleep. But the same law also states that a person who has a “reasonable belief” that consent exists is not guilty of rape.
“It just came on out of nowhere and was irritating,” says Jade, who had never heard of sexual sleepwalking until then. “I’ve been in two long-term relationships for 13 years and I’ve never experienced anything like this.”
The CPS decision meant that the case was dropped and the defendant was acquitted.
Jade was first asked if she slept at the police station when she went to make a formal statement.
In response to a police officer’s question, he revealed several times in his youth that he was always a deep sleeper and sleepwalker.
It was a passing comment, forgotten in the whole tiring process.
Picture: JADE MCCROSSEN-NETHERCOTT
It was Jade’s best friend, Bel, who called 911 and started the whole police process.
He remembers Jade’s voice on the other end of the line. “It was unlike anything I’d heard before. She was hysterical, sobbing and saying, ‘I think I was raped.’ When your best friend tells you that, it’s just devastating.”
The two had gone out the night before at a bar in south London. It was a fun night of drinking and chatting. When it was time for the bar to close, Bel ordered a taxi home. Jade decided to go back to a friend’s apartment with a few people for one last drink.
Around two in the morning, with people still talking around him in the living room, he curled up under the blanket in the corner of the sofa, fully dressed, and fell asleep.
She said she woke up at five in the morning and had no pants and unbuttoned her bra. He says he saw a man on the other side of the couch he was sleeping on.
‘What happened? What did you do?’ I came up to him. And he said something that I thought was a little weird. “I thought you were awake,” she said. She ran and left the door open. I grabbed my phone and started calling Bel.”
Two male police officers arrived and took Jade directly for forensic examination. Vaginal swabs detected sperm from the man on the couch.
The suspect remained silent when questioned by the police. CPS decided to charge her with rape and she pleaded not guilty. The trial even had a date but it never progressed.
Jade was determined to prove CPS wrong by dropping her case. But he had limited time to object.
He wanted all the evidence, including police interviews, toxicology results, witness statements, and reports from sleep experts.
He was shocked by what he had read and the weight given to the theories of sleep experts, in particular.
None of the experts heard him personally. But these views were enough to close the case.
The first expert briefed by the defense concluded that it was “a strong possibility” that Jade had a sexual sleepwalking attack and said that “his behavior would be that of someone who is actively engaging in sexual intercourse with his eyes open and showing off.” Pleasure”.
CPS then hired its own intervention specialist. It concluded that “a history of sleepwalking, even at age 16, and sleep-talking, or any family history, is entirely sufficient to predispose to sexual sleepwalking.”
Jade was shocked. He decided to seek another expert opinion and Dr. Irshaad Ebrahim has experience advising rape cases from the London Sleep Centre.
According to her, it was the first time she had heard of a case in which the alleged rape victim was accused of sexual sleepwalking.
In all the other rape cases she faced, she was the defendant who claimed she had been attacked for sexual sleepwalking.
The BBC did an extensive search and found no other rape cases in the UK where the defense claimed the alleged victim was sexually sleepwalking.
Ebrahim says there is no definitive way to diagnose sexual sleepwalking. However, she said that people she sees with the disorder are typically men and tend to have a history of sexual behavior while sleeping.
Jade then passed the sleep test—a polysomnography that monitors brain waves, breathing, and movement during sleep.
The test showed that he snored and had mild sleep apnea, a common condition in which breathing stops and starts during sleep. Both are potential factors for sexual sleepwalking, according to Ebrahim, so it cannot rule out that Ebrahim may have had an isolated episode.
Jade wanted to know what the odds were that sexual sleepwalking had occurred that night.
“That’s the billion-dollar question,” Ebrahim said. “Asking for a definitive answer in black and white is not going to happen.”
Jade still believed she wasn’t sexually sleepwalking, but was frustrated that the sleep experts couldn’t ignore it.
He then sought a lawyer to understand how the matter was handled in court.
Attorney Allison Summers KC defended the rape cases in which the defendant alleged sexual sleepwalking.
He told Jade that sleep experts can almost never say with certainty whether someone has the condition—but it might be enough to say it’s “possible” for the jury to reach an acquittal.
“I think some of the criminals were acquitted as a result of this. Yes, I am acquitted. But in general I prefer this way rather than convicting really innocent people of serious crimes,” he said.
“All I can say is that you hope the criminal case process will allow these real cases to be distinguished from the less real ones.”
According to CPS guidelines, sexual sleepwalking should always be vigorously discussed in court. But Jade’s case didn’t go to court.
Armed with her research, she filed an appeal.
An independent attorney general reviewed all the evidence.
It concluded that the case should go to court and that it should be challenged in court on the defendant’s account with the opinions of sleep experts.
“I can’t even imagine what you’ve been through and how you’re feeling. During my review, I realized the devastating effect this case had on you,” Jade wrote.
“I apologize on behalf of the ‘Crown Prosecution Service’ for this, but I realize that this will not be very comfortable for you.”
For Jade, the admission that her case had to go to a jury was unsatisfactory as the CPS could not reopen the case.
The accused was officially found not guilty, and thus dual crime laws mean he cannot be prosecuted without convincing new evidence.
“There is no hope of justice for what happened to me,” says Jade. But she hopes CPS will take lessons to prevent others from experiencing similar troubles.
“I was disappointed with a system that was there to protect – and they clearly said they were wrong,” he says.
According to Home Office data, only 1.3% of rape cases recorded by police in England and Wales from September 2020 to the same month of 2021 resulted in a suspect being prosecuted.
The CPS said it was “committed to improving all aspects of how life-changing crimes such as rape are handled and is working closely with police.”
Jade is now processing CPS.
– This text was published at https://www.bbc.com/portuguese/internacional-63152317.
source: Noticias
