The police rape interview that shocked Britain
Witness History
BBC
4.5 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 16 June 2021
⏱️ 10 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
When the BBC broadcast a documentary called 'A Complaint of Rape' in 1982 the public was shocked. It was part of a fly-on-the-wall series about the police in which officers were filmed aggressively questioning a woman about her allegation of rape. It made news around the world and inspired the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher to question the procedure as well as the attitude of those involved. The woman was asked personal questions about her sex life, menstruation and about her mental health. The officers told her directly that they didn't believe her claim. It led individual police forces to reassess the way they investigated allegations of rape. Claire Bowes has been speaking to film-maker Roger Graef about the footage.
Photo: an image from the film 'A Complaint of Rape' by Roger Graef and the BBC (1982).
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know. |
| 0:04.7 | My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds. |
| 0:08.5 | As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely engaging voices. |
| 0:18.0 | What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars, |
| 0:24.6 | poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories and that's just a few examples. |
| 0:29.7 | If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds. Hello and thanks for downloading witness history from the BBC World Service with me |
| 0:45.3 | Claire Bowes. Today I'm taking you back to 1982 and a moment in TV history that helped change the way victims of rape were treated in |
| 0:56.0 | Britain. I've been speaking to Roger Graf about the documentary he made which |
| 1:01.1 | shocked the nation. |
| 1:05.0 | Good evening. The televising of real events has caused controversy before. |
| 1:09.0 | Tonight's televising of policemen |
| 1:12.0 | fiercely questioning a woman complaining of rape, looks like causing |
| 1:15.6 | uproar. |
| 1:16.6 | Listen to me. I mean, sitting here, 20 minutes, half an hour listen to you. Some of it's the biggest |
| 1:21.4 | lot of shit I've ever heard. I can get very annoyed very shortly. |
| 1:25.6 | The most hot issue in the late 70s, early 80s was the way the police treated rape victims. |
| 1:32.2 | The women's protest movement blamed a general |
| 1:35.6 | misogyny by the cops. The police would say no no no it's just one or two bad apples. |
| 1:40.5 | Roger Graf is a filmmaker. In 1981 he spent nine months at a police station |
| 1:46.4 | recording a series of fly-on-the-wall documentaries for the BBC. It was the first time |
| 1:52.1 | police in the UK had been filmed in this way, but his reputation for fairness and accuracy gained him the trust of the chief constable. |
| 2:00.0 | He said, I don't really want you to do this but we're a public service and I think it's only right that people should see what they pay for. |
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