Every two minutes a woman is raped somewhere in the United States; and once every five minutes, a rape is reported. It is estimated that seventy-two of every 100,000 females in the U.S. were raped in one year according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and that 3/5 of women are raped throughout their lifetime. Sexually based offenses, specifically, rape are odious crimes that leave the surviving victim with a lifetime of pain and suffering. The government has placed a time barrier called a Statute of Limitations on many sexual offenses. Rape, in most states, has a statute ranging anywhere from six to twelve years. These statutes place a time limit on when the perpetrator can be discovered and tried for the crime. The government should nationally lift these statutes of limitations for the benefit of the victims.

Rape victims endure a lifetime of suffering and remembrance. The rest of their lives are affected by the crimes against them and these victims deserve justice. These victims suffer from long-term symptoms of “chronic headaches, sleep disturbance, recurrent nausea, eating disorders, menstrual pain, sexual dysfunction, suicide attempts and often an increased in the odds of substance abuse.” The victims remember the crime forever, so why is there a statute limiting the time where the perpetrator can be found, identified and prosecuted for the crime?

A statute is often a problem because many rapes are not reported immediately because the victim often feels physically threatened, unsafe, in denial that the situation

occurred and also because the victim feels pure shame for the violation that was forced upon them. Victims of rape often feel that the rape is their fault.

It is predicted that
only thirty-seven percent of rapes are reported and they go unreported most likely due to the latter causes. If a victim from New York, for instance, were to have an anonymous rape kit performed on them and then he/she decide to report the rape nine years later, there is only one year to figure out who the rapist is before the statute of limitations is up. And if the perpetrator is not found immediately, but there is DNA and other evidence supporting the rape occurred more time is not granted even though the police just have to find the one man in the world who matches the DNA. Take for instance, “Jeri Estler, a rape survivor whose rapist as identified only after the six year statute of limitations of rape had lapsed” (Democracy Now). Jeri Estler’s rapist now can never be prosecuted or penalized for his crime even though there is clear non-arguable evidence against him.

Victims like Jeri Estler, when going public with their rape stories, place trust in the legal system. The victims face the public’s response of “disbelief, scorn, shame, punishment and refusals of help (Madigan and Gamble). To make matters worse, over half of reported rapes are filtered out of the legal system due to the complexity and limited time a perpetrator needs to be prosecuted (Fairstein). Often, rape victims do not receive any compensation from the community or the law; instead they are often filed and forgotten about because the case is dead ends.

The statute of limitations “allows criminals to walk the streets.” The perpetrators are living in your community, working in your office. These criminals have never been penalized or even recognized as the committees of these violent crimes.

The statutes allow known criminals to go untouched and unpunished. Why is it there is a limit to justice when it comes to sex crimes, or to any crime for that matter? Our country is founded on the idea that everyone deserves equality and justice. And if justice cannot be served within the time limit, who’s to say the justice is not still called for? Nobody. Justice should not have a time limit. The perpetrators of heinous crimes such as rape should not go unpunished even if they can scathe the system for ten years because the victim does not forget that they were violated after ten years…the memory haunts them forever. It is argued that “the passage of time significantly diminishes the ability to provide a fair and speedy trial” but that is not true. The passage of time only suggests more evidence is available making the claim of rape much stronger and it is in no way “fair” to have one person suffer for another’s crime who then won’t even be tapped by the long arm of the law, by justice herself.

In effort to aid rape victims and victims of other sexual assaults, research what states have a standing statute of limitations on rape and other forms of sexually based crimes. North Carolina does not have a statute of limitations for any sexually based offense, which is excellent, but only seven other states do not have any time constraints barring sexually based offenses. It is time that the national government lifts the statute of limitations in all states. Citizens should write to senators, judges and any other public official that could lift these statutes from a state, and then nationally attempt to get the statutes lifted. Senators have a lot of say in the government and its procedures. If enough people recognize that the statute of limitations is only injuring the United States and its people, a

change will be made, but in order for that change to be made, a want for change must me summoned.

Another assistance to help the statute of limitations to be lifted in all states would be the forming of action groups like the Rainbow Group. Rainbow is a group formed by rape victims. Rainbow works to have the statute of limitations and other constraining or barring effects to be lifted. The group also is attempting to give rapists more prison-time. The Rainbow Group believes that the rapists do not pay enough penalties for the life-long turmoil they cause rape victims.

The statue of limitations should be nationally lifted to effectively provide justice for all in the United States. The limitations suggest that only in due time justice can be paid and that is not the message our forefathers and founders of the government aspired for. They yearned for freedom, equality and justice for all. And with a time constraint on certain crimes, many victims of crimes are left without justice and the criminals are not paying for their violations.