Distressed caller forced to leave the country after being raped by a ‘friend’ from university
14 January 2023, 15:35
This caller said she 'left the country' after being assaulted
The caller later discovered that another friend also had a restraining order against him.
An LBC caller has told Sangita Myska that she left the country after being raped by a “friend” at university.
‘Mary in Slough’ said: “I was raped by someone that I went to university with, but 10 years later. I went to uni and that was before Facebook and all that.”
“I was at an art event a year later and I saw him with a friend of mine, and I freaked out because I never actually reported it because he knew me”, she said.
The caller added: “That’s the thing with the university factor - they [the students] all know you as well, meaning ‘it's not an off the street attack.”
She went on: “A year after this event I contacted my friend to say: ‘Are you going to be at this event with that guy again?’”
“It turned out that she had a restraining order against him, so how do I know that he didn’t have a whole history as a perpetrator, even back to university?” the caller asked.
“With UCAS it's simply a safeguarding issue”, she said, talking about the role of social media allowing perpetrators to find out more about individuals though friendship groups.
“I had to move to another country, I’ve only recently come back to the country because he was my friend”, she added.
Scottish MP explains how she plans to make universities safer
Sangita sympathised with her caller, and then referred to a conversation with an earlier guest, Conservative MSP Pam Gosal, who wants potential students to be asked to voluntarily tell the university whether they have unspent convictions for a range of crimes.
“It’s really important to have transparency so that everyone in a university community or college community is properly safeguarded”, she said.
Sangita then mentioned that in May 2018, UCAS dropped its requirement for most students to declare that they had a criminal conviction.
However they kept it in place for those applying for subjects like medicine where vocations involve direct contact with the public.
