How can I gather evidence to prove harassment? Use the ONRECORD app!
The ONRECORD app is the best way to gather evidence to prove harassment. It helps you record all the essential details every time you keep a record. A good record will have the date, time, the account of what’s happened, evidence in support of what you’re saying, and a rating of the severity of the event. Once you have uploaded a record, it’s kept safe on our servers and everything is put in date/time order. You can then share your evidence online with professionals or trusted family and friends. People you share with can send you confidential messages in app. You can download the whole or part of the chronology you’re creating whenever you need to.
When you’re gathering evidence you should make a record every time you’re harassed. Ideally a record should be made as soon after the event as you can so you can prove it was fresh in your mind. The timing of when a record was made iis the kind of thing that can end up being important in court when people are trying to prove that you are mistaken or lying. You can also make retrospective records to cover the times that you can recall from the past but they will be perceived as less reliable because of the time lapse. ONRECORD saves the date and time you uploaded a record so you can show how soon it was made after the event. This information is produced as metadata in the chronology so it’s available to those who see it.
With all records, be clear about what exactly the behaviour was, give a clear account of what you experienced and its impact on you by giving it a severity rating score.
To understand what the courts define as harassment and therefore what evidence is important, read: https://www.myonrecord.com/onrecord-helps-you-with/harassment/
If the behaviour includes verbal abuse or offensive comments make sure you record exactly what was said or written. Don’t just say you were “verbally abused” or “offended”. That’s not enough. If you were sexually harassed don’t use vague language like “I was groped” either. Be precise and clear, describe exactly what happened, what you experienced and what was said to you. Use inverted commas when you’re quoting verbatim. Don’t be shy about swear words, record exactly what was said. If the comments were written, upload a picture of the text. The police, lawyers and the courts are used to hearing these stories and the kinds of language that’s used and won’t be shocked by what you’ve produced.
After using the ONRECORD app for a while you’ll be able to show the pattern of problems you’re encountering and their seriousness. As well as being able to see the actual records, the events are displayed on the app in a calendar and a timeline helping you to see your case displayed visually and helping advisers to get a sense of the seriousness of your case quickly and easily.
What help can I get if I gather evidence about harassment?
Getting help with harassment is crucial if you’re to stop it happening and sadly despite the seriousness of the abuse it can sometimes be very hard to get the appropriate authorities to act. Services such as the police have limited resources and they have other priorities. In fact police authorities are regularly being criticised for failing to understand complainants or to help them, sometimes resulting in tragic outcomes. Employers don’t always want to take things seriously either, especially if the abuser is a senior member of staff. You must get their attention and make them take you seriously. Being well prepared is one way of making sure your case is dealt with properly.
With ONRECORD you’ll have kept all your evidence together in one place so the police will be able to see it as a whole rather than a series of single unconnected events dealt with by different personnel. This failure to connect all the information together is often the problem in cases which are investigated and reviewed after a bad outcome. If you use ONRECORD, your lawyer will be able to see the situation you’re in easily and prepare a statement based on your records to get things moving.
Don’t leave your situation to chance and just hope that if the time comes, someone else will sort things out for you. Take control and collect the evidence yourself using ONRECORD and give yourself the best chance of success.
Why should I have to gather evidence to prove harassment and not just leave it to the professionals?
Whether you’re going to the police or seeing a lawyer or other adviser for help with harassment, the first thing you always have to do is explain what’s happening to you. If it’s something that’s been going on for a long time it’s really difficult to remember things accurately without records. You might have experienced different types of harassment over a long time and you won’t be able to remember all of it well or clearly enough. You certainly won’t remember when each event happened. You will probably have forgotten a lot of the details or even actual events and be missing some vital supporting evidence like texts, photos, voice messages etc. You need these kinds of things to prove what you are saying. In addition it’s unlikely you will remember clearly the order in which things happened. It’s all too much to recall and they won’t be fresh in your mind. That’s why the police complete contemporaneous notes when they’ve investigating crimes to give them the best chance of getting convictions. If you’re not prepared well enough you could be humiliated if you take it to court. Be prepared and act decisively.
If you use ONRECORD to gather evidence to prove harassment and make detailed records every time something happens, then the whole timeline and all your evidence will be together in one place, at your fingertips for you to share and get help. You can be sure the events were fresh in your mind and reliable. In addition if you go to see a lawyer you’ll save a lot of money by not having to use up a long appointment trying to recall all that’s happened and when and where and then leave it with the lawyer to compile for a court hearing. That takes a lot of their expensive time and you might have missed out the most important events.
What if I need more guidance on what to record?
You’ll find lots of helpful guidance on this website and online about harassment. Here are some useful links.
Harassment –
https://www.myonrecord.com/how-to-guides/how-to-prove-harassment/
How to make good records –
https://www.myonrecord.com/how-to-make-good-records/
Record keeping example of a harassment case
https://www.myonrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/NewHarassment-Case-Study.pdf
You will also find a wealth of information and help here:
https://www.suzylamplugh.org/pages/search.aspx?q=Harassment
And on the CPS website.
https://www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/stalking-and-harassment