Progress Review: 'Accused Rapists in Queensland, 1945-1955' - Bridget Andresen

It has long been acknowledged that the burden of the onus of proof has often left victims of sexual violence feeling as though they are the ones on trial, rather than the accused. The structure of Australia’s criminal justice system exacerbates this by offering defendants the choice to make an official statement or submit themselves for cross-examination, a choice not afforded to victims, and a choice that defendants overwhelmingly decline. This renders the offenders mostly invisible throughout the judicial process, with the focus almost entirely on the victim’s behaviour and character. In this paper, I use depositions and trial transcripts from fifty-three rape and attempted rape cases in post-war Queensland in order to search for the accused’s voice. Whispers can be found in evidence submitted by other witnesses, and in rare guilty plea cases, where they then submit a brief written confession. With a particular focus on conceptualisations of consent, I reveal how reductive and stereotyped ideas about gender, sexuality, and of sexual violence more broadly, were widely exploited by the accused in an attempt to justify and dismiss their actions, and to place doubt on the validity of the victim’s non-consent.