Woman conceived through rape wins award for campaign to convict father

Authored by theguardian.com and submitted by PepeBabinski
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A woman conceived through rape who campaigned for nine years to bring her father to justice has won a prestigious award.

The 45-year-old can only be referred to as Daisy to protect the identity of her birth mother, who was raped 46 years ago at the age of 13 by Carvel Bennett, now 74. He was convicted in July 2021 at Birmingham crown court and sentenced to 11 years in jail.

Daisy was awarded the Emma Humphreys memorial prize, which recognises women who make outstanding contributions towards ending male violence. She was announced as the winner on Sunday at conference in Portsmouth for FiLiA – a female-led volunteer organisation working for the liberation of women.

Daisy, who is black, believes that one of the reasons why it took so long to bring Bennett to justice was because of her and her birth mother’s skin colour. Although her birth mother named Bennett after she became pregnant with Daisy after the rape, no action was taken by the authorities to charge him. Daisy, who was adopted as a baby, spent nine years campaigning to get Bennett prosecuted after tracking him down herself.

“I truly believe racism was a huge factor both in my birth mother’s treatment in the mid-1970s, but also in my treatment by the authorities,” she said.

Initially, her birth mother did not want to pursue a prosecution against the man who raped her when she was a child. Police told Daisy that even though she described herself as “a walking crime scene”, as her DNA evidence confirmed Bennett as her father, it would not be possible to proceed with a case against him without her birth mother providing evidence. Ultimately she decided that she would testify against Bennett and the rape conviction was secured.

Daisy is now campaigning for a change in the law so that children conceived through rape can be recognised as secondary victims of the crime along with the primary victim, their mothers.

She said she did not know she had been nominated for Sunday’s award and was thrilled to discover she had won it.

“It’s a real privilege and an honour,” she said. “There is still so much silence on the issue of rape conception. It appears to be one of the last taboos in relation to violence against women and girls. For those of us who were rape-conceived, it’s a huge struggle to come to terms with your paternity and in turn one’s sense of self and identity. We are left to carry the shame and stigma of the act of violence that created us.”

Government data released in 2020 shows that 900 women were forced to disclose that they had children conceived through rape in order to access benefits beyond the two-child benefit cap.

Along with her campaign for children conceived through rape to be recognised as secondary victims, Daisy is asking the authorities to consider victimless prosecutions in cases where the victim may be too traumatised to testify or may have died or disappeared, but where there is DNA evidence that could be used to convict the rapist. She is also calling for better treatment and support from the justice system for children conceived through rape.

QwithoutU1982 on October 17th, 2021 at 18:40 UTC »

I grew up with a guy who was adopted as an infant into a wonderful family. His parents were always open about the fact he was adopted, but none of them knew any details of his birth family other than the fact that his birth mother was very young. When he was a young adult, he decided to try to get into contact with his birth mother to thank her for giving him up and to let her knew he was healthy, happy, and successful. He also wanted to meet her. The agency he was adopted through had a system in which he would make a request through them to contact his mother, and if his mother wanted to hear from him they would be connected. She accepted his letter, but responded only with an old newspaper clipping about a man convicted for raping a 12 year old girl. Enclosed was a brief message saying she was happy to hear from him and glad his life is going so well, but did not want to meet him. Ever. He was disappointed, but very understanding

But what a mindfuck for him. He is a super kind, gentle, happy, handsome, brilliant guy with many friends. But he was left to wonder which of his features he inherited from a child rapist. That must be so tough.

green_velvet_goodies on October 17th, 2021 at 18:14 UTC »

For anyone who doesn’t feel like doing the math her mother was 13 and her rapist was 28. Glad she finally got some justice.

PepeBabinski on October 17th, 2021 at 18:06 UTC »

A woman conceived through rape who campaigned for nine years to bring her father to justice has won a prestigious award.

The 45-year-old can only be referred to as Daisy to protect the identity of her birth mother, who was raped 46 years ago at the age of 13 by Carvel Bennett, now 74. He was convicted in July 2021 at Birmingham crown court and sentenced to 11 years in jail.

Daisy was awarded the Emma Humphreys memorial prize, which recognises women who make outstanding contributions towards ending male violence. She was announced as the winner on Sunday at conference in Portsmouth for FiLiA – a female-led volunteer organisation working for the liberation of women.

She stood up for violence against women, more specifically children, and got justice for her mother, proving the apple can fall very far from the tree.