Courts torment child sexual abuse victims with long trial!
ŞERİFE ORUÇ
DİYARBAKIR (DİHA) - As Diyarbakır teacher D.T. continues working at the same school where he sexually attacked at least five girls two years ago, the girls have been re-traumatized by a court that continually forces them to repeat testimony about their abuse.
Adile Ekinci, the girls' school counselor, described the most recent hearing in the trial, which has now continued for two years. The children initially gave testimony to the Children's Monitoring Center, in a procedure designed to provide a less traumatizing space for them. However, the judge has repeatedly ordered the children to describe the sexual abuse in detail in front of their families.
"The fact that these children have gone to court countless times over the last few years has worn them out," said Ekinci. "Whenever there's a court date, the students come up to me at school and say, 'teacher, we'll go to court again, but we're scared.' We don't want them to be nervous, and their situation has affected our psychology as well. One of the biggest factors in this is that the teacher [who molested them] is still free."
Ekinci noted that the girls' entire neighborhood "is constantly talking in detail about the event." Two of the girls' families are currently threatening to pull them out of school.
"Some of them just don't want to speak anymore and they say they can't remember," said Ekinci. "Because it's wearing them out to describe, again and again for two years, in front of their families, the sexual attack they experienced. Still, the court wants to keep forcing them to talk and whenever there's something missing in the testimony the case gets delayed."
Tension in the courtroom has been high. In the most recent hearing earlier this week, the court ejected a union educator who stood up to protest the fact that the girls were being forced to give testimony once again.
"They want the children to get tired, to give up and for there to be an acquittal in the case," said Ekinci. The court recently delayed the case again, until July 6.
(cm/nt)
