The Billings Gazette reports that over the last five years, Yellowstone County, the largest county in the state, prosecuted only about 15% of adult rape cases. And last year, there were precisely zero prosecutions out of the 60 rape cases reported in the county.
Jon Krakauer is the author of the bestselling book Missoula: Rape and the Justice System In a College Town which, explores a spate of unprosecuted sexual assaults in one of Montana's largest cities between 2008-2012.
Krakauer spoke with YPR's Brie Ripley about why Yellowstone County needs a Department of Justice intervention.
Ripley: Based on your time spent in Missoula researching these types of cases, are statistics like these out of the ordinary or to be expected?
Krakauer: Unfortunately they are to be expected almost everywhere, it's still really discouraging, how hard hard it is for women and men who have been sexually assaulted but since most sexual assaults happen to women I tend to usually just say women, but it's really hard to get justice.
Ripley: In Missoula you also helped readers see that Missoula county prosecutors pointed to jurors as part of the problem because of a fundamental cultural misperception of rape, and the Gazettes article did this again. What are some rape myths you discovered while writing Missoula?
Krakauer: The biggest myth perhaps is that women lie about being raped. Well, yes sometimes they do lie but Missoula started keeping track of these kinds of statistics and found that in Missoula, the women who accuse men of rape, only in 3-6% of the times were they false accusations. So that's the biggest myth, that they're out to get revenge because their feelings were hurt. Anyone who sort of studied or examined a rape case, what the victim goes through, would realize that's ridiculous. No woman in her right mind would falsely accuse someone of rape and go through all they have to go through to try to get justice in the legal system. The tried and true defense in rape cases—it works over and over again and the defense council is not about to change this—is you put the victim on trial. You accuse her of lying, you accuse her of all kinds of things—and it works. So it's terrible, it's terribly traumatic.
Ripley: Is there anything about the Gazette article that you find particularly illuminating or highlights a need that Billings must address in your opinion in order to meet the standards of sexual assault prevention and the judicial proceedings that follow, like that which now exists in Missoula as a result of your book?
Krakauer: Yeah I was struck— I was really disheartened by the Yellowstone County attorney. I heard him making excuses you know, we just don't have enough detectives, we're not getting the investigations we need. The people of Billings, the people of Yellowstone County need to understand that this is a serious problem. It's damaging the people in their community and they need to make this a priority, not just sweep this under the rug.
Ripley: Do you think Yellowstone County needs a Department of Justice intervention?
Krakauer: Well, I, yeah. It's important to remember that there were 60 cases that were referred to prosecution and that's less than 20% of the actual rapes that happen in the Billings area, so you know you're talking about really, there were probably more than 300 sexual assaults that happened in Yellowstone County and zero were prosecuted. Now that is shameful any way you look at that, that is a shameful number. No one likes being told they're doing a crappy job and certainly the cops and prosecutors in Missoula were like that, they were good cops and good prosecutors. They were really talented in a lot of ways, it was the culture in their offices that prevented them from doing there jobs. It didn't give them the training, it didn't motivate them, it sort of rewarded them for being cautious and not prosecuting or not filing cases. In Billings, in Yellowstone County, that has to change. Its going to require courageous survivors to keep coming forward even though they don't get justice, but that's what happens. They're the ones who bring about the change, they're the ones who ultimately deserve the credit for what's happening in Missoula—the women who talk to me, the women who talk to Gwen Florio. She's the reporter at the Missoulian who deserves most of the credit for what happened in Missoula, you know, that's why the Department of Justice paid attention is Gwen Florio had the courage to go after football players and coaches who were covering up rapes and she paid a price, she was attacked. She paid a terrible price but she is a tough, seasoned reporter. She brushed it off, she did her job, and she—you need a reporter like Gwen Florio in Billings, that's what you need. She is the one who got the ball rolling and that's what it takes. And maybe if reporters in Montana pay attention to Yellowstone County the way Miss Florio did in Missoula, maybe the Justice Department will come in—or at least in the next administration.
Ripley: Jon Krakauer is the author of the best selling book Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town. Thank you so much for speaking with us today.
Krakauer: You're welcome.
An extended interview with Jon Krakauer is available below
