More cleared of rape – says that the sleeping Swedish Radio

Lina was raped a couple of years ago.

” I remember that I feel something in me. And what it is… I didn’t know if it was his genitals or fingers. I didn’t know how I would move me, if I were to touch me. It was just a stop.

Lina wakes up that she is penetrated, she freezes in fear and shock.

She is raped the court of justice determined. Still given the benefit of the man, because the court of appeal considers that it is not excluded that the man was asleep during the assault. And therefore had no intent, which is required for a conviction.

” I was very shocked. I became downright angry. The idea that it would be this was not. I experienced him as awake.

And there are more cases.

A girl becomes pregnant. She is 13 years old. A DNA sample of the fetus shows that the father is a over 50 year old man. He is freed of child rape, because the court of appeal considers that the intercourse may have occurred in sleep.

another woman wakes up to her friend rape her. He has gone down from the bed, and put her where she sleeps on the floor. The man will be freed, because he may have acted in his sleep.

Fixed it think not Carlos H Schenck professor of psychiatry at the University of Minnesota, and senior researcher at the so-called “sexsomni”, that is, sexual acts in his sleep. He reacts strongly when he is reading the judgment in the latter case.

” this person fits at all, not in the profile of the sexsomni. There are no other events of sexsomni or other documented sleep disorders, ” says Carlos Schenck.

There is nothing consistent with the genuine sexsomni, like Carlos Schenck.

in Total, the Echoes have examined 18 cases from the past six years, when men accused of rape, claim that the assault must have happened in his sleep. On ten occasions given the benefit of man, and in five of the cases given the benefit of the man solely on the basis that the right believes that he may have slept.

It is possible to have sex in his sleep, according to the research made in the area. But only for a few people with specific sleep disorders. Of them it is usually a recurring behaviour.

In Linas they find Carlos Schenck pure error, but also details that can support the honduran.

number the English judges, therefore, there is nothing at all or very little proof that the man actually slept, mean sömnforskaren Carlos Schenck, after reviewing the judges. In three cases, he believes, rather, that the man was drunk.

– There is nothing that gives support to the sexsomni but much that supports that the man was drunk.

the Criticism of the judges get the support of other leading researchers in both sexsomni and law.

It’s nice that this is lifted, like Lina, who otherwise is afraid to sexsomni can be a defense that utilized incorrectly.

– If there is a form of investigation on the sexsomni which shows that it is like this with him. It had I had more understanding of it. But there are, of course not, ” she says.

Lina really called something else.

Emelie Rosén, Echo
emelie.rosen@sverigesradio.se