The brutal rape and murder of Paulina Dembska pushed several to take to social media claiming they too have been victims of harassment and abuse. So why don’t all victims report abuse, asks Sarah Carabott.

In June 2019, a group of young pro-choice activists were told they should be shot “in the head one by one”. Fifteen months earlier, an ex-police officer told the director of the Women’s Rights Foundation he had a bullet for her and that he was willing to burn her alive.

Both incidents were reported to the police, but the inaction from the authorities discouraged them from filing reports about harassment in the succeeding months.

In a totally separate case, the court dropped charges of abuse on a minor after the police repeatedly failed to notify the alleged victim and her mother.

The woman was told there was no legal basis for the Attorney General’s Office to appeal the court’s decision and that the law did not even allow the victim to appeal. The AG also told the woman she should have chased up the case to ensure she gets notified.

Some of the hate speech women were subjected to on social media.

'We feel helpless and unprotected'

Statistics show that sexual assault remains hugely underreported in Malta, with just one of three victims who seek psychological support for such attacks also reporting the incident to the police. 

The victims in all three cases told Times of Malta they have lost all trust in the institutions, which put the onus on the victim to seek justice, re-victimising the victims in the process.

“We feel helpless and unprotected, and the court’s dropping of the case confirmed our fear. It was the last nail in the coffin,” the mother of the abused child told Times of Malta.

“Isn’t a report by the police and a doctor proof enough that something needs to be done? Why should it be up to the victim to seek justice?”

She explained that the abuse by her former partner on her daughter took place following their marriage break-up. A report was filed in 2017 and it was only in 2021, when her lawyer Lara Dimitrijevic casually inquired about the case while at court, that she learnt the charges had been dropped as the police had failed to notify them.

Dimitrijevic herself has also fallen victim to the system. When in March 2018 her NGO launched its position paper on sexual reproduction rights, a man posted on social media: “I have a bullet ready for these killers”, adding that he was “ready to burn any child killer”.

The lawyer, who over the years has had her car tyres slashed and received endless abuse over the phone, filed a police report about the man’s comments, believing there would be some form of investigation.

“One day I was approached by a fellow lawyer who asked me whether I wanted to push for an investigation considering his client was an elderly man and an ex-police officer.

“When I heard he was a former officer, I felt a bit more irked knowing he might really have some ammunition at home.”

Nothing was done about the case, and when she inquired further, an officer told her no further action would be taken as Facebook had not relinquished information requested by the police.

An interminable wait for police action

Hate speech and incitement to violence are both crimes under Maltese law, and recently a man was fined after commenting on Facebook that PN MP Karol Aquilina and activist Robert Aquilina “deserved a beating”. Similarly, Fr David Muscat will shortly be charged in court with hate speech over his disparaging comments on gay people.

But young activist Maya Dimitrijevic and fellow campaigners have been waiting since June 2019 to hear about updates on a report they filed when a man posted on Facebook: “shoot these bitches in the head one by one facing each other”.

In the following months, the activists continued receiving threats, being called “whores”, “sick in the head bitches”, “sluts” and “evil women witches” among others, with one social media user offering advice on what to do when they are raped, while another one commented: “If this was another century you wouldn’t be alive by now.”

But Maya Dimitrijevic has not filed any reports since then: “there is no point because in our case nothing has happened... Unless you are a politician or a celebrity, absolutely nothing will happen about your reports.”

She feels the system has tried to silence the activists: “I have taken all the necessary steps: I called out the abuse online and filed a police report. What else can I do?”