\n
Eventually prosecutors decided to pursue the case and asked Lisa to give evidence against her former partner.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I was asked to give evidence it was the scariest feeling, I just kept thinking, why do I have to, they have all the evidence, why am I being punished?\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was brought round the court room ahead of time to see it. They let me go on the stand and hold a Bible and I just started to shake, I totally fell apart.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was no separation between anyone. Me and my family would have just been sat there beside him and his ones. <\/p>\n
“You have to use the same entrance, the same toilets, you could be using the same car park, I could be standing talking to the barrister right beside him.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I was brought to the REC it was just totally different. I could listen in to the case from there, my family could come, it felt safe. It just wasn\u2019t anywhere near as intimidating.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe morning of the trial I still had doubts that I could do it, but the team at the REC gave me hope that I could.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Sir John Gillen said some perpetrators believe complainants will fold if they have to testify in court<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n\n
Sir John Gillen is the man behind the idea and the hundreds of other recommendations made in the Gillen Review.<\/p>\n
Of those recommendations 62% are fully completed.<\/p>\n
In 21 cases where witnesses were scheduled to give evidence from the REC in Belfast, the defendant pleaded guilty without the complainant having to give evidence.<\/p>\n
Sir John said that was significant.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no doubt there are a number of perpetrators who believe that the complainant will fold and won\u2019t go through with it and as soon as they find out that\u2019s not going to happen, they do the deal,” he said. <\/p>\n
“That\u2019s an important contributory factor. The proof is in the pudding, a number of people have pleaded guilty once these RECs are available.”<\/p>\n
He said the centres were important factors in persuading people to stay within the system and give their evidence.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe only have these centres in Belfast, Craigavon, and a similar facility in Derry, what about Enniskillen, Newry, Omagh? We need more of them, but of course funding and resources is a problem,\u201d Sir John said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut the cost of sexual offences is astronomical. There is no greater crisis in our community than violence against women and girls, and it\u2019s partly a cultural thing that we\u2019ve not yet got to grips with.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
There is also a children’s room at the facility <\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n\n
Lisa is grateful for the Belfast REC, but she is still dealing with the trauma of what happened to her:<\/p>\n
\u201cI honestly don\u2019t think I could have gone if it had been giving evidence in the court,” she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not over for me, there will always be flashbacks and triggers, but why should I live like that, no-one has a right to make me live that way. <\/p>\n
“It took the system to explain to me that no-one has that right.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"3 hours ago By\u00a0Eve Rosato,\u00a0BBC News NI BBC A woman who was seriously harassed and stalked by her former partner has said she only saw the case through because she was able to give evidence away from court. A new remote evidence centre in Belfast opened a year ago. It was one of the recommendations […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37296,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[48],"tags":[13829,595,288,14068],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37295"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37295"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37295\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37297,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37295\/revisions\/37297"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}