For many survivors, the violence does not end when the harm itself ends.

It continues in the silence that follows.
In the fear of whether anyone will believe you.
In the decision of whether it is even “worth it” to report.
In the forms, the statements, the waiting, the explaining, the repeating.
In the way a system that is supposed to protect you can leave you feeling exposed, dismissed, and retraumatized.

For years, survivors have been saying the same thing: the criminal justice system is not working for us.

Now, a major federal investigation has confirmed what survivors, advocates, and frontline organizations have known all along. The Office of the Federal Ombudsperson for Victims of Crime released a report following an 18-month systemic investigation into the experiences of survivors of sexual violence in Canada’s criminal justice system. The findings are deeply validating, but they are not surprising. 

At SAFE, we know this reality is not theoretical.

It is lived.

It shows up in the stories survivors carry. It shows up in the fear, the exhaustion, the self doubt, and the impossible choices people are forced to make after trauma. It shows up in the question so many survivors quietly ask themselves: Will this hurt me even more if I speak up?

Too often, the honest answer is yes.

And that should never be acceptable.

Survivors Have Been Telling the Truth

One of the most painful things about this report is that none of it is new.

Survivors have been saying for decades that reporting sexual violence can come at an enormous cost. Not just emotionally, but practically, financially, mentally, and physically. The report makes clear that many survivors fear being disbelieved, blamed, retraumatized, or further harmed if they report. 

That fear does not come from nowhere.

It comes from what survivors have seen happen to others.


It comes from what many have already experienced firsthand.


It comes from systems that still treat trauma responses like inconsistencies and still confuse pain with unreliability.

The truth is, survivors are often expected to tell the “perfect” story in order to be taken seriously.

But trauma does not show up perfectly.

It can look like freezing.


It can look like delayed reporting.


It can look like fragmented memory.


It can look like emotional numbness, shame, confusion, or maintaining contact with the person who caused harm. 

These are not signs that someone is lying.


These are signs that someone has experienced trauma.

And yet, survivors continue to be assessed through a lens of suspicion instead of understanding.

That is not justice.


That is institutional harm.

Reporting Should Not Feel Like a Risk to Your Safety

The report states plainly that reporting sexual violence should not open the door to suspicion, delay, or further harm. 

But for many survivors, that is exactly what it does.

Coming forward is often framed as the “right” thing to do, but very little is said about what survivors are expected to endure after they disclose. Reporting can mean recounting deeply painful details to strangers. It can mean having your words questioned, your choices dissected, and your behaviour judged. It can mean waiting months or years with little clarity about what is happening. It can mean trying to hold down a job, care for children, stay mentally afloat, and survive daily life while a case moves painfully slowly through a system you never asked to be part of.

For some survivors, reporting is not just difficult. It is destabilizing.

And for many, the decision not to report is not about weakness or indifference. It is about survival.

That matters.

Survivors should not have to choose between personal safety and seeking accountability. They should not have to choose between peace and being heard. And they should never be made to feel like their reluctance to engage with the system somehow makes their harm less real.

The System Still Rewards Harm and Calls It Procedure

One of the most devastating parts of the report is the reality of what survivors experience during court processes, especially cross-examination.

Some survivors shared that cross-examination was worse than the assault itself. 

Sit with that.

A process that is supposed to move toward justice is, for some, more violating than the original harm.

That should stop all of us in our tracks.

And yet, this is often treated as collateral damage. An unfortunate but necessary part of the process. Something survivors are expected to tolerate in the name of fairness.

But fairness for whom?

Survivors are often expected to withstand deeply invasive questioning, attacks on their credibility, and legal strategies rooted in myths and stereotypes that should have been left behind long ago. The report highlights that despite important legal reforms, harmful assumptions still shape how survivors are treated in sexual violence cases. 

This is especially dangerous because trauma rarely presents in the neat, linear, emotionally consistent way people expect.

Survivors should not have to perform pain in a way that feels digestible to the court.


They should not have to sound calm enough, upset enough, detailed enough, or believable enough.
And they should not have to leave a courtroom feeling like the system itself became another source of violence.

Healing Should Never Jeopardize Justice

One of the most disturbing realities raised in the report is the issue of therapeutic records.

For many survivors, therapy is one of the few places where they can begin to process what happened safely. It can be a place of truth, privacy, and healing. But survivors in this investigation described the terror of knowing those deeply personal records could potentially be accessed and used within legal proceedings. 

That means some survivors are forced into an impossible choice:

Do I get support?


Or do I try to pursue justice?

No survivor should ever have to choose between healing and accountability.

And yet many do.

That is one of the clearest examples of how disconnected the system remains from the realities of trauma. The very supports survivors need to survive and rebuild can become something they are later punished for accessing.

It is cruel.


It is harmful.


And it sends a devastating message to survivors: your pain can be used against you.

Delays Do Not Just Waste Time. They Cause Harm.

Another major issue raised in the report is the impact of delay in sexual violence cases, particularly under R v. Jordan. Survivors described the devastation of seeing serious charges stayed because the case took too long to proceed. In some cases, this happened after survivors had already endured disclosure, testimony, and retraumatization. 

That kind of outcome does not just feel disappointing.

It can feel shattering.

Because by that point, survivors have often already paid the emotional price of participating. They have opened wounds. They have prepared themselves to be scrutinized. They have often rearranged their lives around court dates, legal processes, and uncertainty.

And then, after all of that, the case may never even be heard.

The harm of delay is not abstract. It is deeply human.

It is the months or years a survivor spends suspended in fear.


It is the inability to move forward.


It is the anxiety of not knowing if the person who harmed you will face any accountability at all.


It is the message that your case, your safety, and your life can simply be lost in the backlog.

This is not just a system delay. It is a form of harm in itself.

That is a trauma issue.

Survivors Need More Than a Process. They Need Support.

One of the clearest truths in this report is that support changes everything.

Survivors repeatedly spoke about the value of service providers who sat beside them, explained things, advocated for them, and treated them with dignity. Some survivors said these supports saved their lives. 

That matters deeply.

Because while systems often fail survivors, people can still make the difference between further harm and genuine care.

At SAFE, we know this firsthand.

We know how much it matters when someone believes you without making you prove your pain.


We know how much it matters when someone helps you understand your options.


We know how much it matters when support is rooted in compassion, not control.

Survivors do not just need services in name.


They need services that are accessible, trauma informed, survivor centred, culturally responsive, and actually available when they are needed.

And they need to know they should not have to navigate all of this alone.

Support should not be a privilege.


It should be standard.

Some Survivors Face Even Greater Barriers

While the justice system fails many survivors, it does not fail all survivors equally.

The report makes clear that Indigenous, Black, 2SLGBTQIA+, disabled, rural, remote, and northern survivors often face additional and layered barriers when trying to access justice and support. 

This is critical.

Because when we talk about “the system,” we need to be honest about who it was designed to protect and who it continues to leave behind.

A survivor who is Indigenous may face racism and colonial violence on top of sexual violence.


A survivor with a disability may face communication barriers and assumptions about credibility.


A 2SLGBTQIA+ survivor may fear being misunderstood, invalidated, or outed.


A survivor in a rural or remote community may have nowhere nearby to turn.

There is no one survivor experience.

And there cannot be one size fits all responses.

If justice is not accessible to all survivors, it is not justice.

What Survivors Have Been Asking for Is Not Radical

The report outlines 43 recommendations and highlights 10 key areas for reform, including fully investigating sexual violence, humanizing cross-examination, better protecting therapeutic records, automatically offering testimonial aids, improving access to services, strengthening rights, and allowing restorative justice options where appropriate. 

None of this is extreme.

Survivors are not asking for special treatment.


We are asking for dignity.


We are asking to be heard.


We are asking not to be harmed by the very systems that claim to help us.

We are asking for processes that understand trauma.


For responses that recognize power and control.


For options that allow survivors to make informed choices.


For a justice system that does not require us to be broken open in order to be taken seriously.

That is not too much to ask.

It is the bare minimum.

We Need More Than Recognition. We Need Change.

There is something deeply painful about seeing your reality validated in a national report.

Because validation matters.


But it also raises a harder question:

Now what?

How many more reports do survivors need to inspire?


How many more recommendations need to be written?


How many more people need to be retraumatized before meaningful reform is treated like an urgent priority instead of a future goal?

Survivors should not have to keep bleeding into systems just to prove they need to change.

At SAFE, we believe survivors should not have to become experts in policy, law, trauma, or advocacy just to be treated with basic humanity.

We believe support should be easier to access than harm.


We believe healing should not come with punishment.


We believe being believed should not be rare.


And we believe that justice cannot exist in any meaningful way if survivors continue to be harmed in the process of seeking it.

This report is important.


It is validating.


It is overdue.

But most of all, it is a reminder of something survivors have known all along:

The problem was never that survivors were not speaking.

The problem is that systems were not listening.

And if Canada is serious about addressing sexual violence, that has to change.

Not later.


Not eventually.


Now.

Sources

This blog is informed by the Office of the Federal Ombudsperson for Victims of Crime’s November 2025 statement and report: Rethinking Justice for Survivors of Sexual Violence: A systemic investigation.