Ruling about a woman claiming that she was raped
16-3-2005 | IslamWeb
Question:
In your reply to the question about the punishment for rape, you said that "As regards raping a woman it does not necessitate punishment on the man except if he admits it himself or is proven with four witnesses. The woman cannot be punished as well if she claims that she was raped. So it is not correct as you mentioned in your question to say that the woman is wronged."
Can I ask that if semen was found on the body of the woman, and by DNA examination it is found to belong to the suspect, shouldn't he punished, even if he does not agree or there are no four witnesses?
How do you justify when you say that the raped woman is not wronged. In the first place, she should not be punished because she was raped. So the statement that she was not punished does not make any sense. Besides, it should be clear that when a man rapes a woman, she is wronged. And if the system fails to punish the culprit, she is wronged again. How do you say that she is not wronged?
Answer:
All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad is His slave and Messenger. We ask Allaah to exalt his mention as well as that of his family and all his companions.
Among the most important principles in Islam is that claims have to be proven by evidence in order to protect the blood, money and honour of the people from being transgressed because of unproven claims and suspicions. It is confirmed that the Prophet 
said: "If people are granted all they claim to have the right for, then many people would claim the blood and money of others." [Al-Bukhari and Muslim] So whoever claims that he/she is wronged, whether it is rape or otherwise has to provide evidence towards that effect otherwise the accused abuser (wrongdoer) will not be punished merely because of a claim. Therefore, the purpose is to protect the rights of each party, the accuser and the defendant. It is not intended to wrong the woman or prejudice her for the man's sake, as some biased people may think. The purpose of providing four witnesses in rape is to protect people's honour and dignity as much as possible and to protect the society as a whole.
It should be mentioned as well that in common circumstances other than war and the like, rape does not take place unless the woman is dressed in an attractive way that incites rape, for instance when she goes out having applied perfume and not being dressed in Hijab, or when she is alone with a man, or mixed with marriageable men, or travelling without a Mahram, and the like. If rape takes place in such circumstances, then the woman has partially wronged herself as she paved the way for her to be raped. But in general, if a woman observes the religious requirements of not talking in a soft attractive manner and being dressed in Hijab, then her chastity is preserved and dissolute people would very much avoid getting near her. Allaah, the All-Wise and Truthful says (which means): {That will be better that they should be known (as free respectable women) so as not to be annoyed. And Allaah is Ever Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.}[33:59].
As regards DNA testing, it is not a strong evidence in proving a claim. A woman could trick a man and obtain his sperm and then claim that he raped her. Mistakes in testing could happen in the laboratory and the reality proves this. Samples in laboratories could be mixed sometimes in the laboratories; so how can this be an absolute evidence and punish an innocent person because of it?
Finally, we remind the questioner that the expression "the raped woman is not wronged because she was not punished" is not mentioned in our previous Fatwa (referring to Fatwa: 89174).
Allaah knows best.