Promising Practice Programs

Anyone's Story is the product of a unique partnership between the New South Wales' Education Centre Against Violence (ECAV) and NSW Police. It is a contemporary teaching resource for health and police educators to deliver education to workers/members on responding to adult victims of sexual assault. In particular, it aims to provide a training tool for service providers whose behaviour and attitudes can impact significantly on how victims feel in the aftermath of sexual assault, or in the aftermath of disclosing past experiences.

The video addresses the work of police, counsellors and sexual assault doctors or examiners and other health professionals in a bid to promote best practice responses for working in sexual assault victim care.

Anyone's Story directly addresses the misinformation and stigma that has long accompanied the more pervasive myths about what constitutes 'real' rape. It makes clear statements about rape being a crime whatever the victim-offender relationship and urges sexual assault victims' carers, particularly police, to focus on the assailant's actions, rather than the victim's behaviour. The video also canvasses the long-term and short-term consequences of sexual violence for physical and psychological health.

Anyone's Story is divided into two 20-minute parts. First, it profiles the key characteristics, including the incidence and prevalence of adult sexual assault, drawing on interviews with police, counsellors, doctors, researchers and an offender. However, even more powerfully represented throughout Part 1 of the video, are the views and experiences of a small group of survivors who speak plainly of their fears and anxieties about disclosing, and of the circumstances under which they struggled to make their decisions about whether to report to police. The experience of Cindy, an Indigenous woman raped by her then partner, a male victim survivor, are critical inclusions here.

Part 2 of the video relates 'Simone's Story' which is a dramatisation of the sexual assault experienced by Simone, and of the subsequent responses by police and health professionals that follow her initial disclosure.

The video (and/or DVD) includes a companion booklet that provides guidance on how to shape training programs or to facilitate discussion using each part of the video as a training tool to identify key issues.

Appearances on the video include:

• Victim/survivors of sexual assault
• NSW Health sexual assault counsellors, medical officers and coordinators
• NSW Health, Primary Health and Community Partnerships Branch
• Dr Melanie Heenan, Australian Centre for the Study of Sexual Assault
• Non-government services
• NSW Police Forensic Services Group and the Child Protection and Sex Crimes Squad
• Dr Mary Koss, internal researcher
• Eric Hudson, Relationships Australia
• Pam Greer, Consultant and Aboriginal Educator

• Highlighting sexual assault as a criminal offence and a public health issue
• Providing accurate information on adult sexual assault to workers and the community
• Educating frontline workers on relevant legislation and policies and procedures
• Highlighting the range of effective practice responses and options to an adult who has been sexually assaulted
• Promoting initiatives for prevention
• Improving NSW Police initial and investigative response to victims
• Demonstrating interagency responses that provide improved outcomes; and
• Demonstrating the importance of victim care in accordance with the Charter Of Victim's Rights.