Page 16 - Sonoma County Gazette March 2018.indd

She Spoke Up -
‘The Rape of Recy Taylor’
One Day Only Screening and Panel to Benefit Verity
By Maria Halyna Lewytzkyj-Milligan and Evelina Molina
Learning about issues that women face when they have been raped involves
a lot more than opinions about rape culture, intellectualizing the e ect of rape scenes in movies, or reacting to rst-hand ordeals in the media.
When Brock Turner, the former Stanford athlete, received a light sentence
in 2016 for sexually assaulting an unconscious woman, it sparked outrage around the world. Yet leaving ourselves in a collective state of outrage becomes hazardous. Americans are unhappy about what they learned, but we’re not looking at the deeper issue. We have to learn is how that outrage translates into solving the sexual assault problem that permanently impacts women.
In preparation for a community-wide e ort to better understand how we can work together, one signi cant step that we took was to establish Sat On Her Case, a Sonoma County-based volunteer initiative referring to Rape Kits that are not processed in a timely manner leaving perpetrators out on the streets where they can harm more women. If we, as a community, are going to learn more about how rape impacts us, we need reliable research.
We found that we didn’t know what resources are available. As two educated women who have been actively involved in other community e orts, it surprised us that we didn’t know where to look for information and help. It means that there are others just as uncertain as we are.
Sat On Her Case set out to collate the resources, get access the movie She Spoke Up when we were inspired by Oprah who raised awareness about
Recy Taylor at the Golden Globe Awards while accepting the Cecil B. DeMille lifetime achievement award. We decided that hosting an event to show the lm and lead a panel discussion for Women’s History Month would help us in our advocacy e ort, raise awareness of the issue, and lead to more answers, more questions and more solutions.
As part of Women’s History Month, Sat On Her Case is co-sponsoring the lm on Thursday March 29th, 7 pm, at the Rialto Cinema, 6868 McKinley Syreet in Sebastopol. The lm is a bene t for Verity, a local organization that supports wmen who have been victims of sexual assault and abuse. Afterward, we will host a panel discussion on the topic of RAPE KITS* waiting to be processed. Our society is not prioritizing justice against the perpetrators of sex crimes.
”Modern Day Slavery
in Plain Sight”
AAUW is having a FREE event on March 7th to increase awareness of Human Traf cking: 7pm @
Raven Film Center, 415 Center Street in Healdsburg
What is human trafficking? How does it impact you and me? Does
it happen here in Sonoma County? Our Healdsburg AAUW Branch is teaming up with Santa Rosa AAUW and the Healdsburg Soroptimists to educate our community about this growing problem.
Please come on March 7 to view this award-winning lm “Not My Life”, narrated by Glenn Close.
A panel discussion led by Katherine Hargitt, the Chair and Founder of the Sonoma County Task Force on Human Trafficking, will follow.
Dr. Katherine Hargitt, Licensed Clinical Psychologist and a Founder
of the Sonoma County Task Force on Human Trafficking; Elizabeth Quiroz, Trafficking Survivor, Victim’s Advocate and Task Force member; Jessica Stillman, Human Trafficking Caseworker with VERITY – Sonoma County’s rape crisis trauma center in Santa Rosa.
This program is FREE and open to the public. Bring your friends and neighbors. Questions? winkymerrill@gmail.com
Recy Taylor refused to be silent, but many women fear coming forward and want to move on with their lives for many reasons, whether or not justice has been served. Our panel will discuss how we can address some of the issues surrounding the backlog of rape kits that we nd here in our own communities, what we can do, and what is being done to decrease that backlog.
Our panel includes Sonoma County District Attorney Jill Ravitch, Executive Director at Verity Christine Castillo, Sonoma County Chapter of National Organization for Women (NOW) President Elaine B. Holtz, Sonoma County Sheri Robert Giordano and Jade de la Cruz, instructor and owner of Jade’s Women’s Self-Defense.
According to the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault, there are more than 2 million survivors of rape living in California. Thousands of women have to experience what it’s like to nd out that law enforcement Sat On Her Case. We’re nding that it is di cult to nd statistical numbers that give us an accurate picture of the number of rapes in Sonoma County annually or monthly.
As we compile data of how many rapes occur county-wide, we will update
our website: www satonhercase.com and also include information on how rape test kits are collected & processed in order to get a clearer picture of what a rape victim faces, and where and how the backlogs occur. Stay informed on what we nd, and learn more after watching the movie She Spoke Up with us on March 29th at the Rialto. Reception begins at 6 pm; movie starts at 7pm.
Additionally, Sat On Her Case will host a screening of “I am Evidence” in April during Sexual Assault Awareness Month. Well update our website with date and time when details are con rmed.
16 - www.sonomacountygazette.com - 3/18
*A Rape Kit—also known as a sexual assault kit (SAK), a sexual assault forensic evidence (SAFE) kit, a sexual assault evidence collection kit (SAECK), a sexual offense evidence collection (SOEC) kit, or a physical evidence recovery kit (PERK)—is a package of items used by medical personnel for gathering and preserving physical evidence following an allegation of sexual assault.