Serial Rapists Research Articles

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Homecomings: The Belated Return of Japan's Lost Soldiers by Yoshikuni Igarashi

Reviewed by: Homecomings: The Belated Return of Japan's Lost Soldiers by Yoshikuni Igarashi Michael A. Barnhart (bio) Homecomings: The Belated Return of Japan's Lost Soldiers. By Yoshikuni Igarashi. Columbia University Press, New York, 2016. xii, 302 pages. $35.00, cloth; $34.99, E-book. Yoshikuni Igarashi wrote Homecomings as a sequel to his earlier work, Bodies of Memory: Narratives of War in Postwar Japanese Culture, 1945–1970. [End Page 506] The connection is close. Homecomings begins with a chapter examining images of Japanese war veterans in early postwar films, followed by another on Kurita Shigeru's (pen name Gomikawa Junpei) part novel, part memoir, Ningen no jōken (The human condition, a work itself made in film version. These beginnings are interesting enough in their own right. But the value of Homecomings becomes more apparent, and more pointed, as Igarashi turns to the records of actual Japanese servicemen and civilians, the overwhelming majority of whom had been taken prisoner by the Soviet Union during the last week of the Asian-Pacific War and the chaos that followed. These numbered three quarters of a million. One hundred thousand would die in captivity. Most of the remainder were returned to Japan by 1950. But there were others, and these late homecomings form the core of Igarashi's study. Predictably, given the author's approach, this core has two sides. Igarashi is interested in the experiences of the returnees themselves but equally fascinated by the reaction their return created in the Japanese media and society in general. Accordingly, his account ends in 1991, when the splintering Soviet Union released the names of forty thousand detainees to virtually no one's attention in Japan. There was plenty of attention before then, but not in any intuitive way. Kurita's moving Ningen no jōken found critical and literary favor yet was not the stuff of bestseller lists. Ishihara Yoshirō's collections of poetry were even less well known among most Japanese. Although Igarashi does not offer a direct view as to the reasons, he suggests that most Japanese, whether they were military veterans or not, preferred to forget the war years and any experiences associated with them. Veterans themselves were a living reminder and were at times stigmatized as such. They were seen as either duped by fanatic, brutal, often sadistic Imperial Army officers or as brutal and sadistic themselves, potential or even real serial rapists and murderers. Kurita's and Ishihara's jarring works only confirmed these dark images and shadows. Kurita's protagonist, based in Manchuria, tries to do right by the Chinese, but he is alone among a Kwantung Army made up of beasts and demons, and the film version of the work portrays Imperial Army training as a deliberate way of making humans into, well, beasts and demons. If the returnees were not deemed criminals from the start, they hardly found much sympathy from press or public during this period. They had betrayed their oaths to the emperor by allowing themselves to be captured. They had shown themselves weak-minded by succumbing to Soviet "democratization" brainwashing. Or they had shown themselves fascistic by refusing to recognize that Soviet society was more human and humane than the capitalism imposed upon Japan by the Allied occupation. [End Page 507] As these receptions illustrate, Igarashi often has more to say about the Japan returned to than the returnees themselves. His insights are potent, but he usually prefers to offer them by inflection. In some respects his decision is a missed opportunity to respond to the prevailing perspective that, unlike Germany, Japan has not openly or directly addressed its wartime deeds or misdeeds. Embedded in Homecomings is an implied narrative on exactly this subject but one the reader will have to extract independently. The reaction to the brief burst of returnees in the mid-1950s provides one illustration. During the occupation and prime ministership of Yoshida Shigeru, most Japanese subscribed to the idea that the Imperial Army had led polity and people badly astray with catastrophic results. Alas for the returnees, they were less sympathetic figures in this story than the haunting shadows of civilians vaporized at Hiroshima. But this time also...

RIPPLE OF AGONY

The creative project I had written is a novel that is telling the story of a man named, Arya, who seems to be a good man while actually he has a very dark secret and past. He loves to hunt for girl in cafés and he later will do whatever he needs to do in captivating the girl’s heart. When he gets the girl’s heart and trust, he will do what he wants the most, the main purpose of his hunting which is overpowering the girl. In this story, I choose to write about the life of a serial rapist with the theme of love changes everything. It helps me in realizing my aim for writing this work which is to raise more awareness towards the cases of rape that happen around us. In rape cases, the victim is being sympathized while the criminal is being hated. While actually, the criminal also needs support from his surrounding in order to be a better man in the future. What I am trying to say is that we should hate his act, but not the person. In the story, Arya will see how people hate him even after he serves the fifteen years charges and willing to be a better person. As for the genre, I choose realistic fiction in order to make the story believable since it is written based on the research with the main character created according to the characteristic of serial rapist in real life.

Investigating rape: human rights and police accountability

This paper explores the implications of D v Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis [2016] QB 161, a recent decision of the Court of Appeal in which two victims of a serial rapist successfully sued the Metropolitan police for investigative failures relying on Art 3 of the European Convention of Human Rights and the Human Rights Act 1998. The paper reflects upon the extent to which English courts are willing to recognise a duty to investigate within the wider context of civil claims against the police, particularly with regard to failures arising from the investigation of crimes of sexual and domestic violence. The comparative scope of tort and human rights claims is also considered, along with the evolving jurisprudential trend towards drawing a firm line between the two kinds of claim.

Hunting Girls: Sexual Violence from The Hunger Games to Campus Rape by Kelly Oliver

Reviewed by: Hunting Girls: Sexual Violence from The Hunger Games to Campus Rape by Kelly Oliver Christine N. Stamper (bio) Kelly Oliver. Hunting Girls: Sexual Violence from The Hunger Games to Campus Rape. New York: Columbia UP, 2016. Print. Kelly Oliver's study of how society views sexual assault takes a two-pronged approach by examining both real life scenarios from college campuses and youth media portrayals of violence against girls and young women in books and films such as The Hunger Games, Divergent, and Twilight. Throughout Hunting Girls: Sexual Violence from The Hunger Games to Campus Rape, Oliver "consider[s] the contradictory ways in which social media is changing our attitudes toward sexual assault and the reporting of rape" (8). Throughout the book she compares the strong, "hunting girls" of fiction to the hunted girls at universities in order to investigate the ways media might be shaping how campuses discuss and handle sexual assault for real women. In addressing fiction, Hunting Girls analyzes several protagonists who are generally considered strong female characters. In doing this, Oliver also looks at the way these books and movies continue to perpetuate rape and assault culture, despite their focus on women who "give as good as they get" (27). For instance, in her discussion of the film adaptation of Veronica Roth's young adult novel Divergent, Oliver points out a scene in which protagonist Tris, in a drug induced hallucination showing her worst fears, is attacked by her boyfriend. Here Tris "is afraid that her boyfriend might rape her. This is not a fear of rape in general, or a fear of men, but rather a fear of 'date rape.' . . . [T]he scene makes manifest a deep-seated fear that hits close to home—namely, that like Tris, girls are at risk of being drugged, incapacitated, and raped by those closest to them" (40). Comparing protagonists to the classic tale of Sleeping Beauty and the Greek goddess Artemis, Oliver also includes Katniss from Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games, Disney's Maleficent, Bella from Stephenie Meyer's Twilight, and Ana from E. L. James's Fifty Shades of Grey to show how these "strong" women are still sexual prey to the men around them. Wondering what this depiction does for younger viewers, Oliver contests that these young female protagonists are "[n]ot your grandma's princesses: rather than passively waiting, these strong girls fight and kill like men, and sometimes they ask for kinky sex. Perhaps this signals some kind of progress" (25). However, this empowered portrayal becomes complicated when viewing the violence through the context of "fraternity brothers [who] are marching around Yale openly chanting, 'No means yes, yes means anal,' [meaning] it is crucial to ask whether this type of progress actually benefits girls and women" (25). In her examination of current events on university campuses, Oliver not only offers statistics that show how much rape and sexual assault affects young women, particularly those in college, but also demonstrates how technology is changing how rape cases are prosecuted. Relying heavily on Kirby Dick's [End Page 282] 2015 documentary The Hunting Ground, Oliver discusses how universities have cultivated serial rapists, not only because victims are hesitant to report but also because administrations tend to keep cases in-house and do not expel students, particularly athletes, for rape cases. However, where the text truly adds to conversations about rape culture is in its demonstration of how technology is changing the ways sexual assault is documented, and therefore how seriously authorities treat victims' claims. Oliver discusses the prevalence of "creepshots" or voyeuristic photos and videos taken of unaware or unconscious women. Photographing or filming rape and assault has become a new and disturbing norm, and Oliver makes a compelling case for how this trend actually allows for the conviction of more rapists: now that there is hard proof that an assault occurred, cases do not depend on conflicting reports from the people involved. She also discusses consent phone apps, which record videos of partners consenting prior to their sexual encounter. However, these apps seem to protect men from future rape charges more than ensuring consent, as they treat consent as a blanket statement...

The Hidden Criminals in those we Idolize: Elite Serial Rapists

Though the differences in treatment and sentencing between elite and non-elite white collar criminals have been explored in general, little attention has been focused on alleged serial rapists from the general population as compared to those who qualify as famous and/or widely revered, societal figures. This study tracks five males from each of the two categories, analyzing their differential treatment at each stage of the prosecutorial process and their differential sentencing as the legal system determines an outcome. Marked differences between the two groups are identified and discussed, with theoretical interpretations employed. Elite serial rapists as insidious-innovators are offered as an alternative model to current theoretical applications.

American Serial Rape, 1940–2010

Little is known about the social correlates of serial rape or about trends in offending across time and space in the United States. Furthermore, the limited serial rape scholarship that exists was largely generalized from small, captive samples. The current study aims to amplify our understanding of serial rape by pursuing three fundamental objectives. First, guided by theory and research we propose a new, more precise, and comprehensive conceptualization of serial rape. Next, we draw from media representations of serial rape published in five major American newspapers from 1940 to 2010 to develop an offender social profile and to identify patterns in attack style. Our analysis of a broad and diverse sample of serial offenders described in media accounts ( N = 1,037) produced the following profile estimates—age: 27 years; race/ethnicity: African American, 46%; Caucasian, 29%; Latino, 19%; Asian, 5%. Most offenders were employed in unskilled or semiskilled occupations and the most common attack strategy was the surprise approach (47%). Finally, our data allow us to estimate and interpret historical trends as depicted in media accounts. Our analysis revealed low levels of serial rape in newspaper accounts during the 1940s to 1950s, followed by a steady increase (with periodic decreases) leading to a peak in 1991. This peak is followed by a steady and dramatic decline from 1992 to 2010.

“Women and Girls in Jeopardy by His False Testimony”: Charles Dancy, Urban Policing, and Black Women in New York City during the 1920s

Troubling partnerships between the New York City Police Department (NYPD) and criminal informants during the mid-1920s adversely impacted urban African American women’s daily lives. Part of multiple hierarchies of municipal corruption, undercover surveillance operations represented one of many apparatuses law enforcers employed to criminalize black women’s ordinary behavior, to reinforce Progressive era images of black female criminality and promiscuity, and to deny women of their personhood and civil rights. Black New Yorker and criminal informant Charles Dancy, identified by local black newspapers as a vicious con artist and serial rapist, figured prominently in undercover police operations. Dancy falsely identified black women as sex workers and had them arrested, and in the process sexually assaulted women. New York blacks were outraged by some NYPD members’ use of informants as well as black women’s erroneous legal confinement. Situating informant work within the context of police brutality, racial inequity, and the denial of American citizenship, New York African American race leaders, newspaper editors, and ordinary folks devised and took part in resistance strategies that contested police surveillance operations and spoke on behalf of those who were subjected to state sanctioned violence.

Investigating psychologically motivated crimes: The work of the SAPS Investigative Psychology Unit

The investigation of crimes like serial murder and serial rape requires both experience and proficient detective work. It also requires specialist knowledge to identify the psychological and criminological elements of a serial offence. Within the SAPS, there is a specialist unit that deals with psychologically motivated crimes – the Investigative Psychology Unit (IPU). This article draws attention to the contribution the unit makes to the investigation and prosecution of serial crimes in South Africa.

Pharmacological treatment of sex offenders

Most people recognize that incarceration alone will not solve sexual violence. Indeed, treating the offenders is critical in an approach to preventing sexual violence and reducing victimization. In most cases, a diagnosis of paraphilia is associated with sexual violence. This review is intended to present and summarize the first recently published international guidelines about pharmacological treatment of paraphilias. Pharmacological interventions should be part of a more comprehensive treatment plan including psychotherapy and, in most cases, behavior therapy. Antiandrogens, and mostly GnRH analogues, significantly reduce the intensity and frequency of deviant sexual arousal and behavior. GnRH analogue treatment constitutes the most promising treatment for sex offenders at high risk of sexual violence, such as pedophiles or serial rapists, however informed consent is necessary. SSRIs remain an interesting option in adolescents, in patients with depressive or OCD disorders, or in mild paraphilias such as exhibitionism.Disclosure of interestThe author has not supplied his declaration of competing interest.

Study finds campus sexual assaults less likely to be perpetrated by serial rapists

A report published by JAMA Pediatrics investigating the serial incidences of rape on college campuses has found that, contrary to popular belief, the majority of rapes perpetrated by college students are not conducted by repeat offenders. “Many initiatives assume that most college men who perpetrate rape are serial rapists,” the report states in its abstract. However, the study found no concrete evidence to support this and, indeed, found the opposite to be true — 72.8 percent of men who committed a rape in college perpetrated sexual violence in only one academic year. The report did turn up the troubling trend that nearly twice as many men than were previously believed (nearly 11 percent of men surveyed) commit rape during either their high school or college career.

Tales From the Haunted South: Dark Tourism and Memories of Slavery from the Civil War Era by Tiya Miles

Reviewed by: Tales From the Haunted South: Dark Tourism and Memories of Slavery from the Civil War Era by Tiya Miles Leigh Fought TALES FROM THE HAUNTED SOUTH: Dark Tourism and Memories of Slavery from the Civil War Era. By Tiya Miles. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. 2015. By its nature, dark tourism embraces the ugly parts of history and human relations shunned by tours that focus on elegant architecture and heroic city fathers. As such, haunted history tours have become one of the few venues through which public historians have engaged the history of slavery. In Tales from the Haunted South: Dark Tourism and Memories of Slavery from the Civil War Era, the product of Pennsylvania State University’s Steven and Janice Brose Lectures in the Civil War Era, Tiya Miles questions the use of such methods as didactic tools. With a good eye for poetic detail and a thoughtful, charming voice situated somewhere near Fox Mulder on the spectrum between believer and skeptic, Miles acts as her reader’s tour guide through her own inquiries and observations. She begins by sketching out an overview of the popularity of haunted history shows and tourism, and briefly takes her readers on forays into the business of ghost hunting, ghost stories, and of dark tourism as an industry and field of study. The bulk of her analysis focuses on the Sorrel-Weed House in Savannah, Madame LaLaurie’s house in New Orleans, and the Myrtles Plantation near St. Francisville, Louisiana. Naturally, all three insisted upon the title of most haunted in America and appear regularly on ghost-hunter television programs. Miles notes several troubling features of the stories told at these sites. First, each story absolves white, American, male slaveholders from blame for historical wrongdoings, casting the villains as outsiders or the victim as deserving of her fate. They also gloss over the exploitation of black women by describing serial rape as “an affair,” “concubinage,” “infidelity,” and an assortment of other euphemisms that fail to engage the limited choices and realities faced by enslaved women. In each, too, African American spiritual practices are represented differently than evangelical Christianity, Catholicism, or other serious, syncretic belief system holding great power for believers, but as mysterious drums, disturbing rituals, and gris-gris tchotckes. Furthermore, the black communities surrounding these sites do not control the story. As Miles observes of the storytellers and their audiences, these are largely stories told by white people for white people, allowing tourists to brush up against a disturbing past without becoming honestly disturbed. Then, of course, there is [End Page 170] the problem of evidence for the historical events behind these stories and the coincidence of the ghost stories appearing on record just as dark tourism became a market. Miles is less concerned with the lack of evidence behind the stories and more worried about the ways that the owners of these sites squander opportunities to use the “holistic experience” of visiting a house and the frisson of a ghost story to understand a life lived under slavery. Just as southern heritage tours do little to teach about the history of enslaved people, so do these ghost tours flatten their lives into a grand guignol. The possibility of seeing a ghost overshadows sympathy for the pain of a life and death so tragic that, according to lore, would cause a spirit to haunt a site. More upsetting, as Miles points out, the commercial success of tours that trade in stories about violence inflicted upon slaves parallels the business that traded in slaves. Still, she sees potential for these types of tours to engage not only the history but also questions about truth and fact. The engaging and subversive tour given by “Tommy,” the popular, openly gay, African American descendant of the Myrtles’ slaves, Miles believes, suggests that “tourists were apparently willing, even eager, to hear a spirited perspective from an unlikely source even though it challenged conventional expectations” (114). At 132 pages of text, Tales of the Haunted South is a short but deep and complicated volume, combining the history of slavery, the antebellum south, and tourism, as well as public history, folklore, sociology, and the dubious...

Trajectory Analysis of the Campus Serial Rapist Assumption.

Rape on college campuses has been addressed recently by a presidential proclamation, federal legislation, advocacy groups, and popular media. Many initiatives assume that most college men who perpetrate rape are serial rapists. The scientific foundation for this perspective is surprisingly limited. To determine whether a group of serial rapists exists by identifying cohesive groups of young men, indicated by their trajectories of rape likelihood across high school and college. Latent class growth analysis of the 2 largest longitudinal data sets of adolescent sexual violence on college campuses using 2 distinct groups of male college students. The first group was used for derivation modeling (n = 847; data collected from August 1990 through April 1995) and the second for validation modeling (n = 795; data collected from March 2008 through May 2011). Final data analyses were conducted from February 16, 2015, through February 20, 2015. Rape perpetration assessed using the Sexual Experiences Survey. Across samples, 178 of 1642 participants (10.8%) reported having perpetrated at least 1 rape from 14 years of age through the end of college. A 3-trajectory model best fit both the derivation and validation data sets. Trajectories reflected low or time-limited (92.6% of participants), decreasing (5.3%), and increasing (2.1%) rape patterns. No consistently high trajectory was found. Most men who perpetrated a rape before college were classified in the decreasing trajectory. During college, the increasing trajectory included 14 men (15.2%) who reported having perpetrated a rape, the decreasing trajectory included 30 men (32.6%), and the low or time-limited included 48 men (52.2%). No participant in the low or time-limited trajectory reported perpetrating a rape during more than 1 period. Most men (67 [72.8%]) who committed college rape only perpetrated rape during 1 academic year. Although a small group of men perpetrated rape across multiple college years, they constituted a significant minority of those who committed college rape and did not compose the group at highest risk of perpetrating rape when entering college. Exclusive emphasis on serial predation to guide risk identification, judicial response, and rape-prevention programs is misguided. To deter college rape, prevention should be initiated before, and continue during, college. Child and adolescent health care professionals are well positioned to intervene during the early teenage years by informing parents about the early onset of nonconsensual sexual behavior.

Minority of college rapes committed by serial rapists

Minority of college rapes committed by serial rapists

The use of DNA database of biological evidence from sexual assaults in criminal investigations: A successful experience in Brasília, Brazil

The use of DNA databases has proved decisive in many types of criminal investigations. In sexual assaults and rapes, DNA databases and evidence may play a very important role in the investigations and in the identification of the perpetrators. In Brazil, until 2012 and 2013 there was no legislation regarding DNA databases of suspected perpetrators or convicted individuals. As there was no legislation concerning this subject and due to the need for solving crimes related to sexual assaults, the Instituto de Pesquisa de DNA Forense da Polícia Civil do Distrito Federal (Forensic DNA Research Institute of Federal District Civil Police) in Brasília, created in 1998, a DNA database of evidence collected in sexual-assaults cases to aid criminal investigations. The aim of this study is to demonstrate the successful experience of our Institute in aiding criminal investigations to solve sexual assaults cases and to identify perpetrators using this kind of DNA database. Forensic scientists using a DNA database of evidence from sexual assaults cases, working together with Federal District Civil Police authorities and investigators, found 78 serial rapists who attacked 223 women in Brasília, Brazil.

Routine analysis of sexual assault cases in Brasília, Brazil, using 23 Y chromosomal markers

In sexual-assault cases, the use of DNA databases may be decisive in identifying perpetrators. Particularly, the analysis of Y chromosome STRs may play a crucial role in the study of the male portion in (i) male/female cell mixtures, (ii) mixed DNA profiles from more than one perpetrator, or from perpetrators and the sexual partners (iii) and azoospermic or oligospermic perpetrators. The analysis of Y chromosome specific markers can be also important in the study of the geographic ancestry of male lineages. The aim of this study was to genotype samples collected from sexual-assault cases in Brasília, Brazil, using the PowerPlex Y-23 System and to construct a Y-STR database of these profiles in the Instituto de Pesquisa de DNA Forense da Polícia Civil do Distrito Federal (Forensic DNA Research Institute of the Federal District Civil Police) in Brasília, in order to aid forensic casework. A total of 650 evidentiary samples were previously typed for autosomal STRs and, using a DNA database of STRs profiles of biological evidence from sexual assaults, we found 78 serial rapists who attacked 223 women in Brasília. In this work, we analyse 420 complete 23 Y-STR profiles (haplotypes) and we present the results of Y-STR analysis in sexual-assault cases. To assess the substructure of Brazilian populations we conducted Analysis of Molecular Variance (AMOVA) on different Brazilian population groups. The use of a 23 Y-STR DNA database and of an autosomal STR DNA database of samples from sexual assaults in a dual approach of a combined autosomal/Y chromosomal STR analysis played an important role in identifying perpetrators and serial rapists, highlighting the importance of its use in the investigation of sexual assaults.

English

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A Snapshot of Serial Rape: An Investigation of Criminal Sophistication and Use of Force on Victim Injury and Severity of the Assault.

Prior research on rapes reported to law enforcement has identified criminal sophistication and the use of force against the victim as possible unique identifiers to serial rape versus one-time rape. This study sought to contribute to the current literature on reported serial rape by investigating how the level of criminal sophistication of the rapist and use of force used were associated with two important outcomes of rape: victim injury and overall severity of the assault. In addition, it was evaluated whether rapist and victim ethnicity affected these relationships. A nation-wide sample of serial rape cases reported to law enforcement collected by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was analyzed (108 rapists, 543 victims). Results indicated that serial rapists typically used a limited amount of force against the victim and displayed a high degree of criminal sophistication. In addition, the more criminally sophisticated the perpetrator was, the more sexual acts he performed on his victim. Finally, rapes between a White rapist and White victim were found to exhibit higher levels of criminal sophistication and were more severe in terms of number and types of sexual acts committed. These findings provide a more in-depth understanding of serial rape that can inform both academics and practitioners in the field about contributors to victim injury and severity of the assault.

Reflections on the society’s reaction towards rape victims in Delhi City

In general, most people display stronger beliefs in ?aggravated rape? or ?real rape?; including victims of such rape cases who often identify themselves as ?rape victims? than the victims of ?simple rape?, where none of the aggravating circumstances are present. Despite myths to the contrary these ?simple rape? cases in fact make up the majority of cases. This article considers the implications of ?real rape? and demonstrates how notions about what a ?typical rape? should be, in the form of rape myths, directly impact on societal attitudes towards rape victims and how the media continue to reinforce and perpetuate the notion of real rape through their selective reporting of ?serial rape?, ?stranger rape? or especially ?violent rapes?.

Afraid and restricted vs bold and equal: Women’s fear of violence and gender equality discourses in Sweden

This study analyses the responses and reactions among women in Umeå during the period of threat from the Haga Man: a serial rapist operating between 1998 and 2006, and highlights how women in this new situation handled feelings of vulnerability and fear of violence in public space. The article analyses the ways women positioned themselves in their narratives and how this could be understood in terms of how they negotiated spaces for agency within a context where public space has been represented as safe and gender-equal. Women’s fear of violence is discussed in relation to Swedish gender equality discourses and contextual constructions of femininity. The research is based on empirical data collected through in-depth interviews with women in Umeå. The results show the difficulties of claiming the official position of a gender-equal femininity. The informants’ ambivalence, and partly anger, in relation to a femininity they wanted but could not have also created an opportunity for critique of women’s position in society and thus a challenge to a presumed gender equality that stands in the way of addressing issues of gendered power relations.