Can a woman rape another woman?

Rebecca Twinley from the UK describes how she was assaulted and raped by another woman in a public place.
He recounts his struggle for BBC Three, which is reproduced below:
According to Rebecca Twinley, I was violently raped and beaten by a stranger in a public place about 18 years ago.

"I somehow managed to escape from there and went straight home." I was worried about what I would say when people asked me about the blue marks on my face.
The next day I told my friend the whole story.
She said that she could not understand how a woman could rape another woman.
"The act of the violent woman made me lonely and helpless."

The common perception of women is that they are sensitive, emotional and helpful, but most people have a hard time understanding that they can be just as cruel as men.

The rape of a woman by another woman is more a matter of violence than sexual lust.

Also, the lack of understanding among women about consensual relationships makes the problem even more dire.

According to Rebecca Twinley, "That's why I gave up on filing a police report when my friend and colleague turned cold."
I thought if she herself is not understanding this, what will others understand? I needed someone's help and information at that time but I felt completely alone.

A few years after this incident in the UK, in 2010, I started working at Plymouth University and here I had the opportunity to study for a doctorate.

"By now I had known many women who had gone through such a situation, so I decided to research it."

I decided to do an online survey. A questionnaire was prepared in the form of yes and no, which included a final question: Do you consider it possible for a woman to rape another woman?

159 people participated in this survey and none of them answered yes to the last question.

Data on rape like this is hard to come by, but during an interview on a BBC radio show, Une Traynor, chief executive of the organization Rape Crisis in England, told me that 'in 10 per cent of rapes, the perpetrator is the perpetrator. There are women.'

A person who participated in the survey said that the biggest problem is the legal definition of rape due to which such cases do not reach the court.

Until 1994 it was legally recognized in the UK that only men could rape women.

But gay rights NGO Stonewall pushed for the law to allow a man to rape another man.

A petition was filed in 2016 to change the legal definition of rape to include a woman who can rape a man, but the British government rejected it, saying there were no plans to change the current definition. Is.

One woman, Kelly, told me that a woman older than her had been rapping for 16 years. He also spoke to his close friends about it, but they stopped him from filing a complaint with the police.

Another woman, Lauren, said that a woman raped her and that her boyfriend helped her and he also tortured her.
Lauren filed a complaint with the police but did not prosecute them as she was receiving threats.

Lauren said that when she filed a complaint with the police, the policewoman there said it was good to mention it as an experience.

During the research, when I asked a woman why she wanted to be involved in the study, her answer was, 'To raise awareness.'