Peace Corps Promises to Stop Blaming Victims of Sex Assault

Blaming the Victim

Former Peace Corps volunteer Carol Clark, who also testified today, said she too was made to feel responsible for her own rape when she reported what had happened to her in Nepal in 1985. A Peace Corps counselor asked her to list the things she had done to put herself in danger, and what she could have done to prevent the rape. Clark also said the counselor chided her for being late to the meeting, calling it a sign of her irresponsible nature.

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Clark says she was overwhelmed with frustration that she was blamed for being raped, and said the blame still stings 25 years later.

That same sense of feeling blamed is what former Peace Corps volunteers described in the original ABC News report.

Jill Hoxmeier, who was assaulted in the South American country of Guyana in 2007, said that because of the limited counseling and support she got after she was attacked, "It was too hard to navigate by myself and so I just gave up."

WATCH an interview with survivors of sexual assault.

READ full coverage of violence against women in the Peace Corps

ABC News' Mark Schone, Lee Ferran, Hanna Siegel and Randy Kreider contributed to this report.

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