1 We all know the left are pathological liars but couldn't they come up with a more believable lie? You fanatics need to work on some more realistic lies. These just make clear thinking people laugh at you.

2 To be fair, it's not like such things have never happened before. IIRC, some major municipalities were caught doing exactly this and some still do. But it begs the question, did it actually occur in Wasailla (even if it was law), and even if it did happen, since it's a police matter, did anyone in city government even know about it?

Wouldn't this have raised some stink in the town at the time? Shouldn't there be some evidence that someone complained if this was happening? Stories in the local paper? Minutes of city council meetings?

Supposedly, the fact that it was going on specifically in Wasailla is what prompted the state law change, but was that because the police tried to collect money from someone, or did someone read the city law and decide to change it?

3 I haven't read all the coverage of this supposed atrocity, but if the practice of charging victims for rape kits was so commonplace then don't you think that they would have been able to find at least one victim who would be willing to either go on the record or speak anonymously to a reporter about it? Was there no one who was outraged about this until the last couple of weeks? Not a friend, parent, or even acquaintance of a victim was willing to provide a quote for a story?

4 The Left is threatened by Palin so much that the media outfits have thrown out all notions of objective new reporting. Good work knocking this rumor out of the park. I am confident Palin is going to be a force to reckon with in the future. The left is just making her stronger.

5 One would think in a small town like Wasilla, particularly given the national attention it's been getting (along with the national media smearing of Sarah) that someone, ANYONE who was aware of any victims being charged for their own rape kits would have said something by now.

More Palin smears.

*YAWN*

6 This story is definitely part of the net war on Palin and the claim is beginning to show up in Hollywood stars' critiques of Sarah.

It certainly has the look of a Winner type attack. my guess is the tracks on this one are already being erased.

7 People, people, people.

It doesn't matter if there is any truth in it.

It doesn't matter whether Palin knew anything about it.

All that matters is the charge has been made and give the full PR treatment (see The Jawa Report").

We don't get truth. We get what we need to know.

Get used to it.

8 B-b-but... why would Jon Stewart say it if it weren't true?

We don't get truth. We get what we need to know.

Get used to it.

The fact that we're talking about it means we don't intend to.

9 In an article in the Matsu Valley Frontiersman, Published on Monday, May 22, 2000

"Knowles signs sexual assault bill"
http://www.frontiersman.com/articles/2000/05/23/news.tx

the Wasilla Police Chief Charlie Fannon gives a good idea as to how much not charging the victims would cost.

"According to Fannon, the new law will cost the Wasilla Police Department approximately $5,000 to $14,000 a year to collect evidence for sexual assault cases."

If you assume the cost per kit to be between $300 to $1200, that means that there were somewhere between 4 and 45 cases that they anticipated in the next year. If you take an average, it looked like they anticipated billing 10 folks. Sounds high to me for a city of 5 to 10,000, but you have to remember that the rape rate is 2.5 times higher in Alaska than in the rest of the United States.

Try going in with those numbers and see what info you can dig up. Keep up the good work.

10 Well, let's see what a quick Google shows:

LAUREE HUGONIN, Director, Alaska Network on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, came forward to testify. She clarified that
while it may be true that Deputy Commissioner Smith may not have found an instance where law enforcement has forwarded a bill, hospitals have. It has happened in the Mat-Su Valley [skylark note: includes Wasilla], on the
Kenai Peninsula, and in Southeast, and that is why the bill is being brought forward.

3/23/2000 comm. hearing, HR 270

While the Alaska State Troopers and most municipal police agencies have covered the cost of exams, which cost between $300 to $1,200 apiece, the Wasilla police department does charge the victims of sexual assault for the tests.

5/22/2000 Frontiersman, Wasilla, AK



In the past, we've charged the cost of exams to the victims' insurance company when possible," then-chief Charlie Fannon told the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman, the local newspaper. "I just don't want to see any more burden put on the taxpayer."

. . .

Until the 2000 legislation, local law enforcement agencies in Alaska could pass along the cost of the exams, which are needed to obtain an attacker's DNA evidence. Rape victims in several areas of Alaska, including the Matanuska-Susitna Valley where Wasilla is, complained about being charged for the tests, victims' advocate Lauree Hugonin, of the Alaska Network on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, told state House committees, records show.

In cases when insurance companies are billed, the victims pay a deductible.

. . .

It is not known how many rape victims in Wasilla were required to pay for some or all of the medical exams, but a legislative staffer who worked on the bill for Croft said it happened. "It was more than a couple of cases, and it was standard practice in Wasilla," Peggy Wilcox said, who now works for the Alaska Public Employees Association. "If you were raped in Wasilla, this was going to happen to you."

USA Today

I sat with a rape victim during the "harvesting of evidence". Mascara smeared eyes stared blankly out from a cave of shame. "We've got swimmers," announced the forensic tech in the lab next door. My friend didn't look surprised. In her 60's, she was still asked if she felt the need for emergency contraception. Surviving the process would have only been compounded and made worse with an itemized bill; victimized twice courtesy of Sarah Palin and the city of Wasilla.

Via USA Today

11 "...Peggy Wilcox said, who now works for the Alaska Public Employees Association."

So the source for this is the union rep for the public employees union, who according to Google, also happens to be a member of the teacher's union. I wonder who she supports for president?

12 Actually, Peggy Wilcox was a legislative staffer who worked on the bill. That's explained right there in the article.

And her comment is backed up by the minutes of the committee hearing on the bill. Not to mention the word of the former police chief himself.

13 PS, not to mention the local Wasilla paper, at the time the bill was passed.

14 skidmark - How many rapes were there in Wasilla between 1996 and when the law changed in 2000? None of your quotes seem to mention that. Why is there no evidence of this practice actually occurring during Palin's term as Mayor other than by oral recollection?

15 Something else skylark seemed to miss is that all of the "eye witness" accounts are from the past couple of weeks.

With all the outrage (that supposedly took place at the time) one would think the left, with their mo' better edumacshuns and top notch google foo, could produce at least an account from the late 90's.

16 This story's been out there a couple of weeks and the left has tried to use its religious bigotry to pin the Wasilla policy on Palin specifically even though there has been no evidence presented that she implemented it or was aware of it. The claim that she was aware of it because she approve the municipal budget made at Huff Po is just ridiculous on its face.

They need specifics and need to try harder.

17 Nice try skylark, but this whole rape kit story is as phony as the day is long, manufactured by Tony Knowles and his buddies on the Obama campaign by revisionist history. Skylark hides the ball in reviewing and quoting from the committee minutes on the Alaska bill. Read for yourself the committee minutes from the Alaska State Affairs committee re SSHB 270-SEXUAL ASSAULT & SEXUAL ABUSE, and you will get a much different story than skylark trys to spin.

http://www.legis.state.ak.us/basis/get_single_minute.asp?ch=H&beg_line=0317&end_line=0714&session=21&comm=STA&date=20000309&time=0820

The minutes are enlightening and conclusive. Wasilla Police Chief Fannon was, at worst, telling the hospitals at which the rape exams were conducted to bill the victims' insurance companies, which appears to be corroborated by the 2000 Frontiersman story quoting him. But the victims themselves were at no time being charged directly by any police department in the State of Alaska, Wasilla included - this is confirmed in the committee minutes by both Del Smith, Deputy Commissioner, Alaska Department of Public Safety, and Lauree Hugonin, Director, Alaska Network on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault (ANDVSA). We learn the true culprit (as to why some rape victims in Alaska "sporadically" received bills related to their rape exams) was the hospitals - specifically, changes in accounting procedures used by the hospitals in relation to billing insurance companies for rape exams. According to TRISHA GENTLE, Executive Director, Council on Domestic Violence & Sexual Assault, some Alaska hospitals "have chosen to separate some of the costs of sexual assault exams. Hospitals are adding sexually transmitted disease (STD) and blood tests to the cost of sexual assault exams, and the hospital makes a choice to bill the victim for those charges. Police departments are willing to pay for sexual assault exams, but it is an internal decision on the part of the hospital as to who pays the hospital bill." Read the whole minutes of that committee meeting as linked above - some key excerpts are copied below. The minutes from every other meeting on this bill are at http://www.legis.state.ak.us/basis/get_minutes.asp?chamb=B&date1=010181&date2=120180&session=21&Root=HB270 and they all tell the same story, which completely exonerates Palin from the bogus media headlines that she "charged victims for rape exams." Get this out there, quick!!!!!

"DEL SMITH, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Public Safety,
testified in support of HB 270. He noted that it has always been
the position and practice of law enforcement to pay for the
collection of forensic evidence in support of a criminal
prosecution. Under no circumstances, he explained, has he ever
thought it appropriate to bill a victim or even by extension bill
the victim's insurance company. He commented that he does not
think that a victim ought to even see a bill related to sexual
assault whether it is on their insurance form or not. He
emphasized that a police agency investigating a crime should pay
because that is the cost of doing business in the collection of
evidence no matter what the crime; he does not know of any police
agency that has requested payment. The Department of Public
Safety paid $48,659 in fiscal year (FY) 1999 for sexual assault
exams in the state, and so far in FY 2000 the department has paid
$22,880. He indicated that paying for exams had never been an
issue in the department or in the Anchorage Police Department.
He reiterated Representative Croft's comment that Alaska Cares
handles juvenile sexual assault exams, and the department is
pleased with the proposed CS because it leaves payment of
juvenile exams with Alaska Cares.....

CHAIR JAMES asked if she understood correctly that Mr. Smith is
saying that the department has never billed a victim for exams.

MR. SMITH replied that the department might have been billed, but
he has not found any police agency that has ever billed a victim.

CHAIR JAMES said she understood then that some other entity
billed victims and that the department did not think HB 270 was
necessary for the department.

MR. SMITH answered that he did not think HB 270 was necessary for
the Department of Public Safety under the current administration,
but he would feel more comfortable if there were a law that would
make sure sexual exam billings were discontinued.

LAUREE HUGONIN, Director, Alaska Network on Domestic Violence and
Sexual Assault (ANDVSA), ..... emphasized that it is incomprehensible that the
victim should have to relive the crime upon receiving a bill for
the assault exam from his/her insurance company. Just as Mr.
Smith had testified, billings have not come from police agencies
but have come from hospitals. She hopes everything can be done
to expedite the proposed CS because people must understand that
it is not acceptable for the system to re-victimize someone who
has gone through such a horrible experience.

TRISHA GENTLE, Executive Director, Council on Domestic Violence &
Sexual Assault, testified in support of HB 270. She said that
the council believes that the proposed CS needs to be on the
record so that when those rare situations do arise, hospitals and
police officers have clear direction not to charge sexual assault
victims for the exam. She noted that in those cases when a
victim wants an exam but the police do not think it is justified,
the victim can get a medical exam. She explained that a forensic
exam is a very specific process; in most parts of the state there
are sexual assault response teams available to cooperate with
police. She explained that sexual assault response teams are
made up of trained nurses, examiners, and advocates who are able
to meet with a victim. She acknowledged that there are times
when a victim is not sure he/she wants to go through with a
forensic exam, but he/she has health concerns so instead of going
through a forensic exam he/she chooses to go to a doctor for a
medical exam.

REPRESENTATIVE OGAN said he understood that a medical exam choice
on the part of a victim is a personal choice and would not be
affected by the proposed CS.

MS. GENTLE agreed with Representative Ogan's statement and added
that the victim's exam would not be identified as a sexual
assault exam.

REPRESENTATIVE OGAN commented he is puzzled as to why hospitals
are sending bills to victims when the exam has obviously been
ordered by a local police department.


MS. GENTLE answered that there have been changes in hospital
protocol, and hospitals have chosen to separate some of the costs
of sexual assault exams. Hospitals are adding sexually
transmitted disease (STD) and blood tests to the cost of sexual
assault exams, and the hospital makes a choice to bill the victim
for those charges. Police departments are willing to pay for
sexual assault exams, but it is an internal decision on the part
of the hospital as to who pays the hospital bill. She indicated
that there is an issue of insensitivity."

18 skylark, stop it with those facts!n They aren't welcome here, or anywhere else in the right-wing blogosphere! Shame on you!

19 Still with the juvenile nicknames, eh? I suppose you're just dead set on making yourself look foolish. Very well, doodoohead.

The statistics for sexual assaults reported by the Wasilla Police Department between 1994 and 2007 can be found at the city website. For some reason the spamblocker won't let me post the link directly (I'll keep trying), but you can probably pull it up by running a Google search for "City of Wasilla" and "crime statistics."


Aside from the fact that the billing practice was reported as fact by the Wasilla paper at the time, when one of those "oral recollections" is by the police chief himself, I'd take it as pretty accurate.

20 "Something else skylark seemed to miss is that all of the 'eye witness' accounts are from the past couple of weeks."

We don't know if any eyewitness accounts were given with the documentation to the committees hearing the bill, but we do know that the sexual violence advocates speaking to the committee reported on these accounts, and specifically the fact that hospitals in the Wasilla area did forward the bills to the victims and their insurance companies.

On the other hand, the police chief of Wasilla is on record as saying it was the practice at the time. That's pretty much "eyewitness" too.

21 Forget it, skylark! The right wingers are looking for talking points, and now that they've got one nothing will stand between them and their talking point.

Look at how artfully it was phrased to begin with -- that no one's ever been billed, therefore it was a phony issue. Phony enough, of course, for the state legislature to outlaw the practice.

But skylark, I'm telling you -- forget it! Never stand between a wingnut and his talking point!

22 In other news, the state of Berzerkistan now charges $10,000 to report a murder. Since passage of the law, the murder rate has plummeted. "We've never had to implement this, not once, and we are making no money as a result" says Justice Minister DaVichniev Kruscevitz. "We find it a very effective crime fighting tool."

23 Oh, and skylark? If you were to publish the bills, this website and the rest of the wingnutosphere would keep repeating the lie, sort of like Palin has kept telling people that she killed the Bridge to Nowhere when she did nothing of the sort.

You really MUST get past your obsession with facts!

24 To Peter Melaragno:

If I was trying to "hide the ball" I wouldn't have posted the link to the committee hearing minutes, would I?

I posted the quote from the sexual assault advocate to point out that - contrary to what Bob Owens implies - the fact that police agencies don't show records for billing victims doesn't mean the hospitals weren't sending those bills.

Yes, insurance companies were billed. But as pointed out in the committee hearings, the victim herself or himself often received the bill first. In addition, the victim had to pay the insurance deductible. The committee members were quite clear that they understood this and it was their intent to spare the victim having to deal with this.

The portions you are posting from the hearing minutes say that it was generally the practice in the state for law enforcement agencies to pick up the tab for the testing. However, it was also a fact that the Wasilla police department did not pick up that tab.

And the police chief of Wasilla made that perfectly clear in his statement. And in fact, he even said insurance companies were billed "when possible," whatever that means.

(I don't see where it says what happened when the victim wasn't insured.)

25 Skylark, as a patriotic conservative, I demand that you publish the bills sent to the rape victims. Make sure to include their names, addresses and phone numbers, because my friend Michelle Malkin loves to publish names and phone numbers!

We'll get some of our friends to find out of these so-called "rape victims" were really rape victims at all. I doubt they were. They were probably promiscuous Obama supporters, as usual begging for a handout. Isn't pathetic how they'll do anything to make the government spend money, even if its for a free vaginal swab?

C'mon, government money should go where it belongs: To bail out Wall Street when their bets go bad! Rape "victims?" What the hell were they doing outside anyway?

26 Oh, and skylark? If you were to publish the bills, this website and the rest of the wingnutosphere would keep repeating the lie, sort of like Palin has kept telling people that she killed the Bridge to Nowhere when she did nothing of the sort.

You really MUST get past your obsession with facts!
Posted by Magic Dog at September 22, 2008 07:22 PM

I seem to have confused at least one commenter by doing so.

27 Oops, I thought you meant publishing the legislative bill, Magic Dog!

28 skylark, I demand that you publish the actual bills. I want these so-called "victims" humiliated. There is too much whining by so-called "victims." That's all you liberals ever do. Whine, whine, whine. Look, we have a crisis on Wall Street.

Yacht makers are going to go out of business, and you are moaning about so-called rape "victims" in Alaska who are probably Democratic, alcoholic whores?

29 OK, so Wasilla, AK charged for the use of a rape kit.

What exactly is the meta-narrative we're supposed to take away from this? Are you saying Palin has no respect or sympathy for rape victims? Are you saying she's some neo-Christo crypto-fascist who thinks rape victims are getting God's will? What picture are you trying to paint because it's coming across pretty weak. It seems more like you're making a big deal over small town budgets and hoping we'll be repulsed about some--thing unsaid.

Is it regrettable? Yes. Is it a disqualifier for VP? Perhaps, if it were motivated by contempt or spite but this is Sarah Palin. She vetoed an AK bill barring benefits to same-sex couples after the AKSC ruled the denial unconstitutional. She vetoed the legislature's end-run because she said it violated her oath of office to uphold the state constitution. Even though her religion tells her homosexuality is wrong she sets aside personal feelings to operate within the law.

So what are Skylark and Magic Dog trying to say?

30 I posted the quote from the sexual assault advocate to point out that - contrary to what Bob Owens implies - the fact that police agencies don't show records for billing victims doesn't mean the hospitals weren't sending those bills.

Unfortunately, Skylark, you claimed that the police department was directly billing women for rape kits.

Now that that's been exposed as a flat-out lie by the very committee minutes you cited, you're trying to argue that a hospital billing an insurance company for additional tests is the same thing.


If I was trying to "hide the ball" I wouldn't have posted the link to the committee hearing minutes, would I?

Of course, being a typical Obama supporter, you didn't bother to read your talking points prior to citing them; you just assumed that everyone else would be as intellectually lazy as you are.

31 This was debunked long ago - it's nasty lie # 72 about Sarah Palin:

http://explorations.chasrmartin.com/2008/09/06/palin-rumors/

I think we're up to 92 or so now - see the main page...

http://explorations.chasrmartin.com/2008/09/

32 And now it's time to return fire.....by asking the leftist Skylark to explain why Barack Obama is spending campaign money illegally in support of organizations that promote and practice voter fraud.

Put bluntly, Skylark, you and your fellow Obama supporters have an amazing amount of time to draw convoluted webs trying to link Palin to things that happened nearly a decade ago....but seemingly have nothing to say about the Obama campaign paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to organizations that are turning in scores of fraudulent voter registrations that could be used to cast votes illegally right now.

But that's because you fully endorse and support voter fraud.

33 Something else skylark seemed to miss is that all of the 'eye witness' accounts are from the past couple of weeks. With all the outrage (that supposedly took place at the time) one would think the left, with their mo' better edumacshuns and top notch google foo, could produce at least an account from the late 90's.
Posted by: phineas g. at September 22, 2008 06:21 PM

About Wasilla ? WTF kind of drugs are you on chump ?
Are you in Tibet or is there nothing stopping you firing up google yourself and failing to find anything suggesting that Wasilla existed in the 1990s ?

You'd almost be surprised to find someone complaining about people only talking about Wasilla AK in the context of Sarah Palin. But then you'd be underestimating the size of the internet and its ability to connect the stupid to the tubes.

34 Billing for rape exams, either to the victim or their insurance, has been a common practice throughout the United States until the various states and the Federal government changed the laws.

At the time most of these instances happened, 1985-2000, the tests were some of the most expensive that could be performed as part of an investigation of a crime. Rape is little reported and even when reported, not prosecuted in every case. In some jurisdictions the victim is required to assent to prosecution, and some refuse.

I do not blame cash strapped police departments for looking at testing that is both expensive and worthless. In some places lost hikers are charged the costs of their rescue. In civil trials, if you lose you may be assessed the costs to the other side of the trial.

Society has changed its perspective and in nearly every state, and under Federal law, the government now pays the costs of a rape exam. It wasn't always so and Sarah Palin has nothing to do with the topic.

35 Ooooh snap, gang! No evidence anyone was charged! Except for, you know, Wasilla's chief of police admitting they were. From the Anchorage Daily News. Sept. 11, 2008:

A May 23, 2000, article in Wasilla's newspaper, The Frontiersman, noted that Alaska State Troopers and most municipal police agencies regularly pay for such exams, which cost between $300 and $1,200 apiece.

"(But) the Wasilla police department does charge the victims of sexual assault for the tests," the newspaper reported.

It also quoted Wasilla Police Chief Charlie Fannon objecting to the law. Fannon was appointed to his position by Palin after her dismissal of the previous police chief. He said it would cost Wasilla $5,000 to $14,000 a year if the city had to foot the bill for rape exams.

"In the past we've charged the cost of exams to the victims' insurance company when possible," Fannon told the newspaper. "I just don't want to see any more burden put on the taxpayer."

Ruh-roh gang! Maybe do a Lexis search before playing reporter next time?

36 But this story was around the blog-world really fast. Why can't the McCain campaign get the truth out a little faster? I wonder why they're so slow about this stuff.

37 That's a misread of the official statement, Confederate Yankee.
Unfortunately they no longer maintain records from 1996 until the last groupd of relevent maintained records in 2000 ( the period before forensic kits were non-billable items).

That is three years, for which there are no billing records.
If victims or private insurance was billed for the forensic kits, they have no way to tell you.

If Palin had or didn't have direct understanding of the practice, or perhaps did not fully comprehend that it was police evidence the victims were charged for, not "treatment", I have no way of knowing and I hope she did not know.

Small cities strapped for cash try to recoup expenses where they can, but it doesn't make it right. It's really stealing to charge victims or private health insurers for evidence gathered only for the state's (governments) use.

I have bonafides, I really am a concerned conservative.

38 vaskeli, etc:

Fannon, quite simply, appears to have been wrong on what his department did, which is understandable, as chiefs aren't generally bookkeepers. A lot more information has just come in warranting more than an update. I'm closing this thread, and directing you to the new developments.