Double Victimization Research Articles

Double Victims: Poor Women and AIDS

Women constitute the fastest growing group of people with AIDS; a disproportionate number of poor minority women are affected. Education and prevention campaigns have not been directed at this population. Though intravenous drug users have been identified as "at risk," many American women have been identified as HIV positive only after giving birth to a child who develops AIDS. Combating AIDS in women offers a formidable challenge to social service and public health officials because it mandates consideration of intravenous drug abuse, high rates of unwanted and teenage pregnancies, poverty, discrimination and inadequate education.

The double victim: The sexually abused child and the judicial system

The American judical system continues to dampen the willingness of juvenile victims of sexual abuse to testify against their alleged abuser. A recent example of this continuing double victimization appears in the U.S. Supreme Court decision ofCoy v. Iowa (1988). The rights of minor sexual abuse victims are explored through case law, statutes, legal literature and historical references as they impact the minor during the judicial process. It is difficult to achieve justice for sexually abused children in a judicial system designed for adults; thus, the sexually abused child remains a double victim in our contemporary judicial system.