Bracing the Armor: Extending Rape Shield Protections to Civil Proceedings

Abstract

While almost all states have evidentiary protections excluding evidence of past sexual history for rape victims in criminal proceedings, very few have adopted similar protections in civil proceedings. This paper examines the need to extend these protections in order to encourage victims to come forward not only to be compensated for their injuries, but to hold their attackers fully responsible and encourage reporting. Civil proceedings provide a number of advantages to rape victims not available in criminal courts, but are nonetheless susceptible to the same cultural myths that make rape shield protections necessary. I argue that rape shield protections should be extended to civil proceedings for the purposes of both liability and damages.