Drug Facilitated Sexual Assault
Picture it. You wake up. You're naked. You have a pounding headache, aching muscles, and no recollection of the night before. One minute you and some friends are getting a ride to a party, the next you're waking up here, on a stranger's bed in a room you've never even seen before.
You search around in the dark for a minute or so, and piece-by-piece you find the clothes you were wearing last night. You quickly pull on your underwear and jeans, and are about to throw on your top when you notice something's wrong. There's a long tear stretching down from the neckline of your shirt. For a minute, you just sit there in confusion - what the heck happened last night?
Then, a spark fires in your brain. You remember something from the night before that makes your skin crawl, and in a single instant, your life is changed forever. You're not sure, but you think you've been raped.
This is drug-facilitated sexual assault, and no one's really sure how often it happens. Often known as "drug rape" or "date rape", drug-facilitated sexual assault is when someone uses the fact that you've taken or been given alcohol or drugs to sexually assault you.
Sometimes a victim may have "date-rape" drugs slipped into their drink, making them an easy target. These drugs may affect their memories, and make it difficult for a victim to remember the assault. Other times, someone may just take advantage of a person who has had too much to drink or took drugs willingly - a girl who passes out at a party, for example. Sexual assault can be anything from unwanted kissing or touching, all the way up to full-blown rape.and while rape is clearly worse than an unwanted kiss or touch, all sexual assaults are serious crimes.
Last Modified: September 5, 2006
