Rape Victims Forced To Pay For Evidence

[JonLP24]

Source: KPRC Houston

HOUSTON -- Victims of sexual assault are getting bills, rejection letters and pushy calls from bill collectors while a state crime victims' fund sits full of cash, Local 2 Investigates reported Thursday.

"I'm the victim, and yet here I am. I'm asked to pay this bill and my credit's going to get hurt," said a single mom from Houston.

She received bills marked, "delinquent," after she visited a hospital where police told her to have evidence gathered. Officers assured her she would not pay a dime for that rape kit to be handled.

"That was unreal," she said. "I never thought I'd be out anything for what I went through."

She was 44 years old when she was attacked in her own bed. She said she awoke to find a burly 15-year-old friend of her son assaulting her. He was found delinquent, meaning he was convicted, in juvenile court, thanks in part to the evidence gathered with the rape kit.

Read more: http://www.click2houston.com/news/19400415/detail.html#-

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Link has video

[Captain Hilts]

1. Whew! I'm glad we live in a post-sexist society! nt

[FiveGoodMen]

2. We've sunk mighty low!

[Dr.Phool]

3. The spirit of Sarah Palin lives on.

Unfortunately.

[downindixie]

4. Could the State be doing this so

they can keep the large balance in this fund? Maybe it's the interest on this large fund that they are trying to keep for themselves?

[Old Coot]

6. It is apparently bureaucrats being bureaucrats.....

They seem to have rules they are following. The true fault seems to lie with the legislature.

[merwin]

48. I got my ass reamed for saying basically the same thing.

It's pure bureacratic bullshit. You can jump through hoops to resolve it on a case-by-case basis, but the problem (private health care) still exists. If we had universal health care, this wouldn't be an issue at all. All of the other three parties involved in the billing (hospital, police, insurance companies) should all be paid for as a basic right.

[depakid]

5. Molly Ivins said it best:

It's a low-tax, low-service state--so shoot us. The only depressing part is that, unlike Mississippi, we can afford to do better. We just don't.

[elleng]

7. Was this on tv, law & order type show, some time ago,

or was I dreaming about texas??? Holy S***!!!

:mad: :mad: :mad:

[merwin]

8. Where in there does it say she was forced to pay? This article is pure BS.

She just needs to go through the proper channels. Sure, it sucks that there's so much red tape, but the article describes exactly what she needs to do first... which is to submit it to the police department again (doesn't make clear in the article if the one payment they made was their entire responsibility) and get in touch with her insurance company to see how much they will cover. Provide documentation of the police either paying their share or refusing to, and what your insurance will cover, and the hospital will cover the rest.

It's the way our system is set up in this country. It's in no way there to punish rape victims.

I was in a motorcycle accident several years ago, and in Washington State we don't have to carry insurance. I didn't have it at the time the other driver hit me. I submitted claims to my health insurance (which gets reimbursed to the insurance company after a settlement), and the health insurance company told me I had to submit it to my auto insurance company. It took dealing with a few reps and a couple of managers, but they made an exception to their regular policies and got it sorted out.

And the "thanks in part to the evidence gathered with the rape kit" sentence is suspect in my opinion. If it was a friend of her son that assaulted her, she would have been able to identify him and it would have been an open and shut case to begin with.

[JonLP24]

9. Delinquency notices certainly implies 'forced to pay'

Sure she doesn't have to pay but it will damange her credit according to the article and the video.

[merwin]

44. If you're mis-billed and you don't try to resolve it, are you also "forced to pay"?

There are ways to resolve this issue in about 6 phone calls. Not fun ones, mind you, but she is not being forced to pay. The article lays out exactly the process she needs to take to resolve it. Call police department, make sure they pay the full amount that they are obligated to pay. Call your insurance, make sure they pay the full amount that are obligated to pay. Call the hospital back and they pay the rest.

If one of them refuses to pay, there's plenty of lawyers who would take this case pro-bono. Or file in small claims court if it's under a few thousand dollars. In most states you can't get sent to collections if there's legal proceedings regarding the bill.

I despise that she has to do this to get the problem resolved after that level of trauma, but it's the way the system is set up in this country. It's a symptom of a larger problem with our medical system.

[Tempest]

10. MAJOR FAIL

http://health.usnews.com/blogs/on-health-and-money/2008/02/21/rape-victims-can-be-hurt-financially-too.html

[Seldona]

15. Great article.

Thanks for posting. This is just wrong. If ever there was a legitimate use of Victim's Compensation Funds, this is it. Run out? FUND IT!

This has got to be traumatic to the unfortunate people involved. Having the rape not only brought up again, but in a context that you owe a bill for being a victim and getting treated like shit if you can't pay it.

Way to treat the victims of one of the worst violent crimes imaginable. That's COLD.

[Baby Snooks]

20. Thanks for posting this...

The problem isn't just in Texas.

[kimmylavin]

14. I'm sorry, but what the hell are you talking about?

Are you actually comparing the hassle of a motorcycle accident to a RAPE?

Should the victim of a rape have to spend so much time going "through the proper channels," as you put it?
Hours and hours of phone calls telling complete strangers that you were violated in such a horrible way?
Begging them to pay the money that they already should be paying?
Are you freaking kidding me?

[Berry Cool]

22. Yeah! It's bad enough having to run the gantlet of medical insurance red tape

because you were gobsmacked by an illness, but to have to do it because you were raped??? Please!!! All that crap should be handled behind the scenes, by someone else paid to do it, and the person who was raped should not have to lift a finger. And that person CERTAINLY should not be having her credit rating damaged!

[MrsBrady]

32. agreed

I don't understand...there should just be some kind of process where
the hospital just sends the bill to the county or whatever jurisdiction, and be done with it.
I don't see why that is so hard.

[merwin]

41. I completely agree with you.

The only thing you need to understand is that the hospital is trying to make as much money as possible, and that happens by offloading the responsibility to the PD and the insurance companies. At the same time, the insurance companies are trying to make the same profit, so they bounce you back. The PD is worried about their budget so they don't want to pay anything.

The system is fucked.

[One_Life_To_Give]

51. Beaurocrat charged with protecting the taxpayer

The administrators of the funds have at best conflicting goals. Sure they are supposed to pay out the intended expenses. But they are also charged with making sure that none of the money is used for anything that doesn't qualify. So the system gets built with all kinds of hoops to be jumped thru to ensure that only those qualifying expenses are paid out.

If they ran out of funds because of paying out for unintended expenses. We would probably be just as quick if not more so to hang the beaurocrat for failing to safeguard the funds.

[merwin]

33. The problem is with our medical system.

What I'm saying is that she wasn't singled out because she was raped. It's just the way our shitty system works.

[merwin]

40. I'm not comparing a motorcycle accident to rape.

However, I am comparing the billing aspects of it, as they are being treated identically.

I'm pointing out the reality of the situation as it is in our country. This is what you get with for-profit health care... a cold, uncaring corporation that doesn't think about the emotional aspects of anything.

And btw, you seem to be a bit biased yourself. "the hassle of a motorcycle accident"? Try several years of rehab and not being able to do many of the activities you used to do... trivial things like giving your son a piggy-back ride.

[Lars39]

18. Do the estates' of murder victims have to pay for the police to process

the evidence?

[FloridaJudy]

27. Amen! eom

[merwin]

37. I'm sure if the police did the rape kit themselves (not sure how that would happen) then

it would have been covered. Your argument has no valid point in relation to my comment, as a murder scene has nothing to do with the hospital/medical system in our country. As far as I know, no private doctor (unless they are specifically contracted by the police) comes to a murder scene. But if they did, whoever owned the property would get stuck with the bill.

This speaks volumes about how screwed up our medical system is. The article was written like it was specifically saying that it's intended to screw over rape victims, when in reality this how privately funded hospitals operate.

[enlightenment]

23. You have not a single clue what you're talking about, do you?

What utter tripe.

[merwin]

38. Would you mind elaborating?

I have vast experience with the financial side of hospitals (had my fair share of visits, bills, etc) and they do everything they can to screw you over. The only way to get it taken care of is to jump through their hoops.

I am not saying rape victims should be forced to pay. I'm saying that as a corporation it is their job to make a profit, and they do that by implementing strict rules that you have to fight with them over in order to get them to bend on.

Fix this rape kit billing problem and you're stuck with hundreds of other procedures that are equally harmful mentally (and physically if your credit goes to shit) to patients as being footed the bill for a rape kit.

If you want to put your finger in a dike, by all means go after this injustice. If you actually want to solve the problem, look beyond the fluff piece and fix the underlying issue... private health care.

And no, I'm not calling the fact that she was raped "fluff". I'm talking about the news organization's decision to go after and print this. It has nothing to do with anything other than tugging at people's heartstrings in order to sell more copies. Let's see if they follow up on this any more or work at all to change the laws. I bet this is the last we hear of this story.

[Name removed]

24. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Heddi]

25. "get in touch with her insurance company to see how much they will cover"

wtf? Seriously. Get in touch with her insurance company to see what they will cover?

SHE WAS RAPED
SHE WAS THE VICTIM OF A SERIOUS VIOLENT CRIME

her insurance ain't gonna pay shit, firstly.

Secondly, what if she DOES NOT HAVE INSURANCE, like 3/4 of Americans in this country? Too bad for her being poor and being raped?

Thirdly, it's obvious you have no clue what rape cases are like, and it would not have been "open and shut" just by her description of the attacker WITHOUT DNA/SEMEN evidence. Because all he has to say is "Prove I had any kind of sexual contact with her". Without DNA/Semen, there is no evidence of sex-based attack.

Although I shouldn't be surprised that any of this has never occurred to you considering that you even dare to compare UNINSURED MOTORIST INSURANCE to RAPE.

You are a masterful piece of work. And I mean that in the most insulting way possible

[liberalhistorian]

29. THANK YOU. Couldn't have said it better

myself and I was just planning to post the exact same points before I read your response. That poster is, indeed, a masterful piece of work, all insult intended. That's the kind of bullshit we women still have to deal with nowadays.

And there's the matter of why the HELL should she have to go through all of that jump-hoops-through-the-bureaucracy bullshit after the trauma of being raped? Unbe-fucking-lievable.

[merwin]

42. I don't believe that anyone who suffers that kind of emotional harm should

have to take care of any of it. I was simply pointing out how our system works and how it can be resolved on a case by case basis. It completely blows, and adds insult to injury, but it's the way it is.

If you want to fix it, you have to go a bit beyond this rape kit story and look at the big picture. I apologize if I came across insensitive, but I have a tough time believing that the company who wrote this article cares any more about that woman and her plight than the hospital or insurance company does. They wrote it to make people emotional and sell copies, and basically said there was absolutely nothing she could do about the situation.

Fact is, there is something that she can do... it's shitty, embarassing, and mentally damaging, but it would take care of the monetary part of things. I don't see in that article anything except the most superficial attempts at trying to actually help this woman... aside from the fact that it's probably already completely paid for by now to avoid bad PR.

I think that NOBODY should have to go through all of the hoops after any trauma. What I (apparently unsuccessfully) was trying to get across is that:
1) The system is broken. This is only one incidence that points this out.
2) Rape victims are not the only ones affected by this. The article doesn't point out that hospitals fuck everyone over, not just rape victims... and yes, it's equally difficult and humiliating for people who haven't been raped to beg with the gods of the medical system for more time to pay bills and the collection calls that follow.
3) A much bigger change needs to happen to fix this problem. Change the law, and they will find another way to screw over victims of violent crimes.

I'm sorry if you feel that I'm attacking you as a woman. That was not my intent at all. I'm more pissed off at the article for implying that this is an isolated incident.

If you want to have an actual conversation with me, I would be happy to over PM... but you should actually try to go off of more than one post before throwing the "that's the kind of bullshit we women still have to deal with" crap at me... or just keep on making snap judgements. I really don't care either way, as personal attacks at people say more about the attacker than the attackee.

[merwin]

34. Good to know.

All I'm trying to say is that this has nothing to do with her being raped, and everything to do with our broken medical system. The story is sensationalist for that reason. She was not being singled out because she was raped. Everyone who's ever had to go to the emergency room ends up dealing with the nightmare of bills that come afterward.

[pnwmom]

26. She shouldn't have to submit any of this to insurance or anywhere else.

This is a criminal case, not a motorcycle or car accident.

The bill should be going straight to the state or the P.D. Not the victim.

And you couldn't be more wrong about the need for a rape kit. Without the evidence from a rape kit, the case becomes a "she said/he said" situation -- far from open and shut. In fact, she could be prosecuted for having sex with a minor!

[merwin]

39. I agree with you that the bill should go to the state or P.D.

However (playing devil's advocate...) the hospital can (and is) arguing that a rape kit is not a medical necessity, as a case can proceed without one. They will argue that the bill should go to the police department or insurance company (since the hospital would consider this an unnecessary procedure... not an emergency situation). Since hospitals are generally now for-profit operations, this is a valid stance for them to take as a corporation looking out only for their bottom line.

Personally, I want to rip the throats out of the people that run these hospitals and make the laws that support this kind of activity, but it's the reality of the situation. If you want things to change, you need to go beyond a case-by-case basis and get hospitals out of the hands of corporations, and furthermore get rid of private health care.

[Milspec]

28. You are wrong on so many levels..

Words just fail...

You sir, are an ass

[merwin]

45. Please inform me of my levels of wrongness.

How else am I supposed to learn?

I'd much rather have a civil discussion than be called an ass. But if that's what you need to do to feel better, then go for it.

[uppityperson]

30. Criminal cases are different from motor vehicle accidents. &are you seriously saying that

"If it was a friend of her son that assaulted her, she would have been able to identify him and it would have been an open and shut case to begin with." So there was NO need to collect any evidence, just say a friend of your son assaulted you and there you are?

Innocent until proven guilty is how the law works, which is why evidence collection is so important. Good grief.

[Zhade]

35. Ah, DU's resident anti-woman voice squeaks again.

Have you no fucking shame?

[merwin]

43. How am I being anti-woman exactly? By pointing out that there is a way to resolve

the financial part of things? By pointing out that hospitals are uncaring and screw everyone over? Did I say anywhere that she should be forced to pay, or that she deserves it?

I'm sorry if my brain works more in a problem-solving way than an emotional one, but it's reality. My wife (who, incidentally, volunteers for the local crisis hotline) forgives me for it, and I do everything I can to stop myself before trying to solve her problems when all she wants is someome to talk to and listen to her.

But, by all means, continue to think of me as anti-woman.

[Ms. Toad]

36. Not an appropriate response

Rape survivors should NEVER receive a bill for the ER visit in the first place. The bill should be sent to law enforcement. This is not a civil matter (as your motorcycle accident was) - it is a criminal one. Specifically, it is a crime against the state. The woman is "merely" a witness for the state against whom the crime was committed. The cost of collecting evidence for the prosecution of a crime - from wherever that evidence is found - is billable to law enforcement. Not witnesses to the crime.

(As painful as that legalistic view of rape is - it does make it very clear where the cost of collecting evidence belongs.)

As far as being able to identify the rapist making it an open and shut case - I suspect you don't have much real world experience with rape cases. Identification of the rapist is only the tip of the legal battle iceberg.

[merwin]

46. You're right about that. I shouldn't have said open-and-shut.

I should have said "not necessary to prosecute", as that is how the hospital sees it. Unfortunately, in this case, it seems like either the article is wrong, or your view of the situation is inaccurate. Seems to me like the law is written that in a rape case the PD is only responsible for a certain amount, which I wholeheartedly agree is not what should be going on.

Knowing how insurance companies work, the PD probably has a set cost for the price of a rape kit, which is all they will pay (like an insurance company). The hospital marks that up about 50% or so and says that your insurance company has to pay what they will pay before the hospital will "eat" the rest (which was actually pure profit to begin with).

Have you ever noticed on your insurance bills there is a contractual cost of most items? The doctor bills the insurance company an untra-high cost. The insurance company then pays the contractual amount that they say the procedure is worth and the doctor discounts the rest, so they can take it as a loss. The PD is acting more like a private insurance company than a government operation (which scares the hell out of me).

[Odin2005]

50. But is does cause secondary traumatization.

Rape victims are not in the state of mind to be able to worth through such bureaucratic BS. That they are expected to is insensitive crap that I dare say IS based on subconscious sexism.

[Odin2005]

11. There are no words...

:puke:

Things like this only traumatize the victim more. Disgusting.

[varelse]

12. There is no excuse for this

Equal protection under the law means equal protection for EVERYONE.

[merwin]

49. I don't see how equal protection fits here.

As long as they are applying the same standards to everyone, there is no equal protection argument here. If they were giving a minority different treatment (ie: police department doesn't pay because the victim is black) then there would be a valid argument.

However, you are correct that there is no excuse for this behavior from the hospital or the local government.

[JBoy]

13. How much could a state possibly be saving with this idiotic policy?

Some rich celebrity should set up a fund to cover such costs, then go public and expose these backward assholes.

Paging Miley Cyrus....

[bemildred]

16. People need to learn to tell these "health care" businesses to fuck off. nt

[ejpoeta]

17. so they get raped, and then get charged for it. that's rich. boy,i'm glad i live in ny.

[Name removed]

19. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[jwirr]

21. Are the victims of other crimes asked to pay for their evidence gathering?

Discrimination!

[merwin]

47. Not necessarily, if you look at it from their perspective.

Greedy as hell, however... The PD values a rape kit at a certain amount. The hospital values it at another (usually much higher than the actual cost). The PD pays what the rape kit actually costs, which leaves a balance. Since you may have secondary insurance, that must be billed first according to hospital policy. After that, the hospital can make the decision to eat the remainder (which it seems like they do in rape cases, according to the article).

Logistically, it seems like that should work out without a remainder... but apparently someone isn't wanting to pay their share of the cost. From the article, it seems that the PD only paid a portion of what they were supposed to pay, causing the mess.

[Tx4obama]

31. This story

is getting more airtime than when the same thing was uncovered up there in Alaska.
The media should have covered this issue more when Palin's town/state was exposed!