(no subject)

[rivka]

Via Bitch, Ph.D.:

When Sarah Palin was mayor of Wasilla, the town charged rape victims for the cost of collecting evidence.

While the Alaska State Troopers and most municipal police agencies have covered the cost of exams, which cost between $300 to $1,200 apiece, the Wasilla police department does charge the victims of sexual assault for the tests.

Wasilla Police Chief Charlie Fannon does not agree with the new legislation, saying the law will require the city and communities to come up with more funds to cover the costs of the forensic exams.

In the past we've charged the cost of exams to the victims insurance company when possible. I just don't want to see any more burden put on the taxpayer, Fannon said.

Fannon is the guy who was hand-picked by Palin to be police chief after she fired the incumbent because, as a member of her staff explained to ABC News, "we needed people with new energy and a new vision."

People, apparently, who don't want the poor overburdened taxpayer to have to pay for the police to do their damn jobs. At least, not when it came to dealing with some slut who went and got herself raped - because apparently burglary victims got their evidence collected for free.

Comments

[kcobweb.livejournal.com]

It's likely that victims are coming in to Wasilla from the surrounding area as well for testing/treatment. Possibly even from other nearby towns - often in small towns, rape victims have a lot of concern for their anonymity/privacy: people they know will see them at the hospital and then the word will spread.....

[nex0s.livejournal.com]

Considering that the entire state's population is smaller than Brooklyn alone, that doesn't give me much comfort.

N.

[kcobweb.livejournal.com]

Found via Google:

Alaska, where 90 percent of the state cannot be reached by a road system, in 1999 reported 83.5 rapes per 100,000 females compared to a U.S. average of 32.7 per 100,000 females, according to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports.

The rates for Anchorage (62.8 per 100,000 females), where more than half the state's population dwells, compared to the state rate (83.5 per 100,000 females) suggest that rural areas disproportionately shoulder the burden of higher rates of rape, according to the report. And data from the Alaska State Troopers suggest rural areas have the highest rates of sexual assault.

source

[nex0s.livejournal.com]

And all this does is make me want to ask, "What is wrong with Alaska?!"

And why do rural folk demonize city folk? Because it's obvious that statistically I'm safer in a city than out in the country.

N.