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Disclosing Sexual Crime

Disclosing to someone that you have been the victim of a sexual offence has been described as stepping out of an airplane door and not being sure if your parachute is going to work. This is especially true of historic sexual offences, where the victim has lived with, and sometimes normalised their experiences, often over decades. The stigma of being a victim, the shame about not stopping the offence or making a disclosure sooner, the anxiety about how family, colleagues and partners will view you, all act as inhibitors to making disclosures; these continue even after disclosure is made. The purpose of this chapter is to discuss the authors lived experiences of investigating sexual offences and of making a disclosure of historic sexual abuse to his employer.