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10 Harv. Women's L.J. 59 (1987)
Rape and Women's Credibility: Problems of Recantations and False Accusations Echoed in the Case of Cathleen Crowell Webb and Gary Dotson

handle is hein.journals/hwlj10 and id is 67 raw text is: RAPE AND WOMEN'S CREDIBILITY: PROBLEMS OF RECANTATIONS AND FALSE ACCUSATIONS ECHOED IN THE CASE OF CATHLEEN CROWELL WEBB AND GARY DOTSON JULIE TAYLOR* INTRODUCTION When the national media trumpeted the story in 1985 that Cathleen Crowell Webb said she had lied when she testified in 1977 that Gary Dotson had raped her, people seized on the re- cantation as proof that the words of a rape victim cannot be believed. Fascination with the story cut across- all age, class, and occupational groups, and was reflected and magnified in the me- dia's front-page coverage. Feminists, who had fought to have the criminal justice system respect the veracity and anguish of rape victims, cringed. This Article discusses the credibility problems of rape victims in the law and in the public imagination that Webb's recantation revived. Suspicion and disbelief of women who charge men with rape have for centuries had a stranglehold on the substance and operation of laws nominally designed to protect women against rape. As a result, many women did not report or prosecute rapes because the process was so often humiliating.' Webb's actions * Associate, Hill & Barlow, Boston, Massachusetts; B.A., Cornell University, 1977; J.D., Harvard Law School, 1986. 1 See, e.g., S. BROWNMILLER, AGAINST OUR WILL: MEN, WOMEN, AND RAPE 190-91 (1976). Massaro, Experts, Psychology, Credibility, and Rape: The Rape Trauma Syndrome Issue and Its Implications for Expert Psychological Testimony, 69 MINN. L. REV. 395, 422-23 (1985); Note, The Rape Corroboration Requirement: Repeal Not Reform, 81 YALE L.J. 1365, 1374-75 (1972). See also Bienen, Rape III-National Developments in Rape Reform Legislation, 6 WOMEN'S RTS. L. REP. 170, 205-06 (1980) (on theory of under- reporting due to humiliating response from system). It should be noted that some rape victims are men; this fact is frequently ignored, as are the male victims themselves. Men often do not report being raped because of problems similar to those of women; they, too, find hostility and skepticism when they report being raped. See H. KAY, TEXT, CASES AND MATERIALS ON SEX-BASED DIsCRIMINATION 904 (2d ed. 1981); A. GROTH, MEN WHO RAPE 135 (1979); MACKELLAR, RAPE: THE BAIT AND THE TRAP 63-64 (1975).

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