Do we care about the consequences?

Crime is one of the main aspects discussed amongst the evening news and printed amongst the black and white writings of the daily newspapers, especially those of a gruesome or disturbing nature. In particular nearly 66% of headlining articles in one week were in direct relation to a violent crime most often including rape or murder. However I have observed another aspect of crime reporting that previously had gone under my radar in terms of understanding crime and the media. This is the relationship between the media reporting of a crime and the issue of sentencing and judicial involvement as it seems that most of the time the justice system is seeming to fail when it comes to sentencing.

The main concern that seems to be represented is the issue of sentencing in regards to cases that involve sexual assault or as it is often referred to in the general public the issue of rape. It seems as though we as the public are bombarded with the failures of the justice system in dealing out sentencing that is seen to be proportionate to the brutality and horrific nature of the crime. An example of this supposed failure is seen in the appeals case in which a man was acquitted of aggravated sexual assault that he was found guilty for in 09 and is only serving a three year sentence for having repeated sexual intercourse with a child. This article was written in a tone that clearly demonstrates disapproval for this outcome and would obviously spark rage amongst the public as the use of the word 'child' portrays a much more sinister picture then referring to the victim as a 15 year old female.

This got me thinking, how much of this is true and to what degree has the media sensationalised the failures of our justice system in regards to this horrific and degrading crime, are they simply exploiting the publics sensitivity and empathy to sell more articles? It may sound cynical but this was the conclusion I had come to until I stumbled upon research that found two out of three sexual assault related cases result in no conviction due to insufficient evidence and heavy reliance on the "he said she said" concept due to the often private occurrence of these crimes.

Therefore is a combination of the media over-exaggerating the failure of the system in the two out of three cases that result in no conviction or is there actual grounds their tendency to blatantly point out the failures in sentencing? It is however obvious that something needs to be done as less than one third of victims were found to report their sexual assault a number that should be sitting at 100%.