Thread: War on Women : Rape

June 5 at 1:18pm ·

Washington Post,

1. Use his mugshot. He is a criminal. I didn't ask for his pristine Stanford yearbook photograph or his "All-American Swimmer" smile. This man is a rapist.

2.

"Turner’s future was once bright. He began swimming at age 2 in his home town of Oakwood, Ohio. At age 10, he was named in the local newspaper as helping his swim team win a championship. By the time he entered high school, he had already won the Ohio Junior Olympics. When [Brock] first did the backstroke, his instructor had to jump in and get him because he looked like he was drowning,' his mother, Carleen, told the Dayton Daily News in 2010. 'It’s amazing to see how he’s grown.' He kept going, earning a spot at the U.S. Olympic team trials just two years later, and then leading Oakwood High School to two straight state titles. Turner turned down scholarships at a host of universities to attend Stanford, where he joined a top-10-in-the-country swim team. But on Jan. 17, 2015, midway through his freshman year and first swim season at Stanford, Turner’s life and career were upended during a night of drinking."

Thank you, Washington Post, for this detailed track record of Brock Turner's swimming career, which is so incredibly relevant to the fact that he was just found unanimously guilty of committing an unforgivable act. I'm sorry things were so sudden for you, Brock. That your career was "upended during a night of drinking." Since you know, that's all it was, just a casual night of drinking when you raped an unconscious woman behind a dumpster.

These articles constantly remind me that you go to Stanford, headlining with "All-American Stanford swimmer," as though your attendance at such a prestigious university and your athletic ability should by default consider you to be too intelligent and too talented to be found guilty of rape? A Stanford student who apparently cannot recognize the difference between an unconscious and conscious body, consent and the lack thereof, but a Stanford student nonetheless.

3.

"Although Turner’s blood-alcohol content was twice the legal driving limit, he testified that he remembered what happened that night. The woman, whose BAC was more than three times the limit, did not."

Ok??? So she was drunk, okay. Alcohol didn't take her clothes off, nor did it throw her behind a dumpster and rape her while she was unconscious. Her alcohol consumption does not decrease the severity or validity of this crime. You cannot simply equivocate drinking with rape. It is pathetic and almost comical that this is even included in the article, intoxication and sexual assault are not synonyms.

4.

"It was a stunning fall from grace for Turner. Once a record-setting swimming prodigy, he is now a convicted sex offender at age 20," and towards the end of the article, "Turner was also asked where he hoped to be in 10 years.
'In residency to be a surgeon,' he responded."

I'm so sorry, Brock, that you've suffered so greatly from your own actions. That you believe you are the victim. That this act has stripped you of your degree and titles at the age of 20. Yes, 20 is young, but not young enough to misinterpret an unconscious woman for sexual consent, nor young enough for the malicious and immoral nature of rape to go unrecognized. I do not pity you.

Brock was sentenced to only 6 months in jail, on the basis that, "a prison sentence would have a severe impact on him." As if being raped did not take a severe and irreversible emotional toll on the female victim. This boy is apparently too intelligent, too wealthy, too white, too athletic, to belong in jail.

I could go on for hours about multiple other parts of this article that are unacceptable, but this post is long as it is. The amount of victim shaming in this article, as well as the constant recognition of Brock's accomplishments and aspirations, are both disturbing and inadmissible. The use of this language only further perpetuates the misogyny that is already so deeply engrained in American rape culture. Do better, Washington Post.

Ladies, the handling of this rape case and its portrayal in the media should offend you immensely. It is a slap in the face to the woman involved, as well as to women everywhere. A blatant disregard for our rights and our worth. This is inexcusable.

Judge Aaron Persky Under Fire for Sentencing in Stanford Rape Case
By LIAM STACKJUNE 7, 2016

A California judge harshly criticized for giving what many say is a too-lenient sentence to a former Stanford student convicted of sexual assault has been bombarded by threats of violence against him and his family, an official said on Tuesday.

The judge, Aaron Persky, 54, on Thursday sentenced the former student, Brock Allen Turner, 20, to six months in jail for three felony counts: intent to commit rape, sexual penetration with a foreign object of an intoxicated person and sexual penetration with a foreign object of an unconscious person.

Threatening phone calls have flooded into the Santa Clara County Superior Court since then, said Gary Goodman, a supervising attorney for the county public defender’s office.

“People have been calling the court and leaving messages, and if someone answers, they say, ‘Tell your judge he can go to hell, and I hope his kids get raped and he rots in hell,’ ” said Mr. Goodman, who has defended the judge. “He’s getting threats over this, him and his family, from all over the country. Is that right?”

Here is what we know about the jurist.


Who Is Judge Persky?

• A former corporate lawyer and former criminal prosecutor who was appointed to the Santa Clara County Superior Court by Gov. Gray Davis in 2003, according to the Santa Clara County Bar Association. The judge is up for election this year but is running unopposed.

• A Stanford alumnus. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the university, he was the captain of the men’s lacrosse team, according to a 2002 article in The Stanford Daily.

• While campaigning for a judgeship in 2002, he wrote a biography for the League of Women Voters of California that championed his work as a prosecutor in cases involving violent sex crimes and hate crimes.

“I focus on the prosecution of sexually violent predators, working to keep the most dangerous sex offenders in custody in mental hospitals,” he wrote. If elected, he said, his top priorities would be “honesty and integrity” and “equal access to justice for all.” (He lost the election and was later appointed to the bench.)

• He said he served as a member of the executive committee of the Support Network for Battered Women and the Santa Clara County Network for a Hate-Free Community.

What Is the Controversy About?

• The judge handed down a six-month sentence and three years probation to Mr. Turner, a champion swimmer convicted in March of attacking the 23-year-old woman behind a Dumpster on campus in 2015. The victim, who was not a Stanford student, had attended a fraternity party. Two graduate students riding past the Kappa Alpha fraternity house witnessed the assault and intervened to stop it; one chased and tackled Mr. Turner when he fled.

“We saw that she was not moving, while he was moving a lot,” one of the students, Carl Frederik Arndt, told the Swedish news outlet Expressen on Tuesday. “She was unconscious the entire time,” Mr. Arndt also told CBS News. “The guy ran away, and my friend Peter chased after him.”

• The case attracted national attention on Friday after BuzzFeed published a powerful 7,244-word courtroom statement by the victim, who detailed the horror of that night and asserted that male and class privilege had irrevocably marred the trial and the sentencing.

“When the policeman arrived and interviewed the evil Swede who tackled you, he was crying so hard he couldn’t speak because of what he’d seen,” she wrote. She called the students who held her attacker until the police arrived her “heroes.”

But of Mr. Turner, she said: “You took away my worth, my privacy, my energy, my time, my intimacy, my confidence, my own voice, until today. The damage is done; no one can undo it.” Her letter was also released by Santa Clara County.

• The furor grew after Michele Dauber, a Stanford law professor and sociologist, tweeted a statement by the defendant’s father complaining that his son’s life had been ruined for “20 minutes of action.”

• Judge Persky was also excoriated for his comments about the defendant. In citing factors he weighed in the sentencing, The Guardian reported, the judge said Mr. Turner had “less moral culpability” for his actions because he was intoxicated, and he had “no significant record of prior criminal offenses.”

The judge also appeared to suggest that the jail sentence might be an “antidote” to the anxiety the former student may have suffered from the intense media attention. He told the courtroom, according to reports: “A prison sentence would have a severe impact on him. I think he will not be a danger to others.”

And seeming to accept the defendant’s account (Mr. Turner said the victim consented), the judge said: “I take him at his word that subjectively that’s his version of his events. … I’m not convinced that his lack of complete acquiescence to the verdict should count against him.”

Because of his conviction, Mr. Turner must register as a sex offender. In his courtroom statement, obtained by The New York Times, he cited the university’s “party culture” and drinking as factors in the sexual assault.

Who Are His Main Critics?

• Besides a flood of critical comments online against the judge, Professor Dauber, a friend of the victim’s family, said that she was part of an organization seeking to recall him. She said because the judge had no opponent and will be “automatically re-elected” in November, the recall campaign was the only way to remove him. (Judge Persky won his race in the California primary Tuesday.)

She said his ruling had made female college students unsafe and cited what she called the judge’s misapplication of the law in taking Mr. Turner’s age, academic achievement and alcohol consumption into consideration.

“If you’re going to declare that a high-achieving perpetrator is an unusual case, then you’re saying to women on college campuses that they don’t deserve the full protection of the law in the state of California,” the professor said.

• A Change.org petition backing the judge’s removal had collected more than 400,000 signatures by Tuesday. In order to successfully remove the judge, the recall campaign said it would need the signatures of at least 20 percent of the votes cast in November in Santa Clara County.

• On Tuesday, lawmakers weighed in: Senator Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri, who prosecuted sexual assault cases as a lawyer, said the sentence didn’t appear to provide adequate punishment, according to The Hill. “Typically, that would be considered an inappropriate sentence,” she said. The office of Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrat of New York, said that a “short sentence sends the wrong message.” (The senators have lobbied fellow legislators to change how the military handles sexual assault cases.)

• The Stanford Daily said the judge’s decision had outraged campus groups. Students were being urged to join a demonstration during the traditional university graduation procession that kicks off commencement on Sunday.

Does the Judge Have Any Defenders?

• The Santa Clara County district attorney, Jeff Rosen, whose office tried the Stanford rape case, said in a statement on Monday, “While I strongly disagree with the sentence that Judge Persky issued in the Brock Turner case, I do not believe he should be removed from his judgeship.”

• Molly O’Neal, the Santa Clara County public defender, said she was “alarmed by the hysteria” surrounding Mr. Turner’s sentence. “The judge is required under California law to consider certain mitigating and aggravating factors,” she said, including past criminal records and the presence of alcohol. “We need to be very careful we’re not hanging judges out to dry based on one decision, especially because he is considered to be a fair and even-tempered judge,” she said.

• Mr. Goodman, the deputy public defender, said he had worked with the judge for three decades and denounced the proposed recall. He said Judge Persky was “an exceptional jurist” who had accurately followed the relevant rules and statutes and formulated the sentence in consultation with the probation department.

“You have to judge a case on its merits only,” Mr. Goodman said. “The narrative on social media is ‘We have to judge this case as part of the larger social issue of campus sexual abuse,’ but as a judge, he is not allowed to do that.”

He rejected the argument that race or social class Because of his conviction, Mr. Turner must register as a sex offender. In his courtroom statement, obtained by The New York Times, he cited the university’s “party culture” and drinking as factors in the sexual assault.


http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/08/us...on-persky.html

thought for the day : does this set a dangerous precedent for DWI ?

The Guardian reported, the judge said Mr. Turner had “less moral culpability” for his actions because he was intoxicated, and he had “no significant record of prior criminal offenses.”

To Brock Turner’s Father, From Another Father
 06/07/2016 01:54 pm ET | Updated 41 minutes ago
John Pavlovitz -Pastor and Writer


Dear Mr. Turner,

I’ve read your letter to the judge on behalf of your son Brock, asking for leniency in his rape conviction.

I need you to understand something, and I say this as a father who dearly loves my son as much as you must love yours:

Brock is not the victim here.

His victim is the victim.

She is the wounded one.

He is the damager.

If his life has been “deeply altered” it is because he has horribly altered another human being; because he made a reprehensible choice to take advantage of someone for his own pleasure. This young woman will be dealing with this for far longer than the embarrassingly short six months your son is being penalized. She will endure the unthinkable trauma of his “20 minutes of action” for the duration of her lifetime, and the fact that you seem unaware of this fact is exactly why we have a problem.

This is why young men continue to rape women.

This is why so many men believe that they can do whatever they please to a woman’s body without accountability.

This is the reason so many victims of sexual assault never step forward.

This is why white privilege is real and insidious and usually those with it are oblivious to it.

I understand you trying to humanize your son in your letter; talking to the judge about his favorite snacks and swim practice and about the memories that are sweet for you as his father — but to be honest I don’t give a damn and if his victim was your daughter I’m quite sure you wouldn’t either.

I imagine this young woman had favorite snacks and sports too, and parents who had wonderful plans for her that didn’t include this nightmare.

There is no scenario where your son should be the sympathetic figure here. He is the assailant. He is the rapist. I can’t imagine as a father how gut wrenching such a reality is for you, but it is still true.

Brock has to register as a sex offender because he sexually assaulted an incapacitated young women. This is why we have such requirements; because one vile act against another human being is one too many, because we don’t get a do-over when we do unspeakable things, because people need to be protected with knowledge of others in their midst who have failed so egregiously at respecting another person’s basic dignity.

The idea that your son has never violated another woman next to a dumpster before isn’t a credit to his character. We don’t get kudos for only raping one person in our lifetime. I don’t believe your son is a monster but he acted like one and that needs to be accounted for. To be sure, this decision is not the sum total of Brock’s life, but it is an important part of the equation and it matters deeply.

And to be clear, Mr. Turner, “alcohol and sexual promiscuity” are not the story here. The story here is that young men have choices to make and these choices define them, even if those choices are made when temptation is great and opportunity is abundant. In fact, our humanity is most expressed when faced with such things, we choose integrity and decency; when we abstain from doing what is easy but wrong.


We as parents don’t control our children. Most parents understand this. Despite our best efforts to the contrary, they fail and fall and do things we’d never consent to. I certainly hope this is such an occasion, though it is not coming across that way in your letter. It feels like you want more sympathy and goodwill toward your son than you want for the survivor of his crime, and that’s simply not good enough for her or for those young men and women watching.

You love your son and you should. But love him enough to teach him to own the terrible decisions he’s made, to pay the debt to society as prescribed, and then to find a redemptive path to walk, doing the great work in the world that you say he will.

For now though, as one father to another: help us teach our children to do better — by letting them see us do better.

This post originally appeared on JohnPavlovitz.com.

Need help? In the U.S., call 1-800-656-HOPE for the National Sexual Assault Hotline.

Follow John Pavlovitz on Twitter: www.twitter.com

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-p...10339418.html?

Matt Lang
June 6 at 5:13pm ·

I've been drunk many times, even in the presence of promiscuous women who were also drunk, and I managed not to rape them, so I don't think drinking and promiscuity are the problems.

This here is the problem: some guys are entitled pricks, and they're entitled pricks because their fathers and coaches and friends taught them to be entitled pricks. Because they are entitled pricks, they think they can have whatever they want, and that their worth is defined by what they have and what they take.

Alcohol has this capacity to unlock what, deep down, we've always wanted to do. For me, that means, occasionally, running naked in places I probably shouldn't, like through libraries or deserts (remember for next time: deserts=cactuses). But even at my most intoxicated, I've never lost sight of the fact that rape is wrong, because I was raised to know it's wrong. No amount of alcohol can depress that value.

Brock Turner and his ilk were never taught that. They were taught that they can have what they want, when they want, including women. And that's equated with being a man. Brock Turner thought he was entitled to a little "action" any way he could get it, and he thought that long before he got drunk. The alcohol didn't introduce that thought, it unlocked it. That thought: "I can take whatever I want, including her", was planted and watered by a whole, rotten village.

It is right that we shame him, and his father, and the friend that came to his defense, and the judge, and every other entitled prick we meet.

Just as importantly, we need to love our boys, and teach them the dignity of the body, and how to live through disappointment and confusion, and how to navigate confusing feelings, and how to separate feelings from action, and how to communicate and listen. We need to redefine for them what it is to be a man, that their worth doesn't come from that which they have and take.

Vice President Joe Biden penned an open letter to the Stanford sexual assault survivor who read a powerful message to her assailant in court detailing the effects of his actions on her.

Her letter has since been read by millions of people and has drawn attention to the judge’s six-month sentence for Brock Turner — the champion swimmer who was convicted of three counts of sexual assault — even though he faced up to 14 years in prison.

Biden, who wrote the 1994 Violence Against Women Act and is involved in the White House’s “It’s On Us” campaign against campus sexual assault, sent the letter to BuzzFeed News on Thursday. In it, he said he is “filled with furious anger — both that this happened to you and that our culture is still so broken that you were ever put in the position of defending your own worth.” He said the woman’s actions “will save lives.”

“I do not know your name — but I know that a lot of people failed you that terrible January night and in the months that followed,” Biden wrote. “It must have been wrenching — to relive what he did to you all over again. But you did it anyway, in the hope that your strength might prevent this crime from happening to someone else. Your bravery is breathtaking.”

Here is Biden’s letter in full:

An Open Letter to a Courageous Young Woman

I do not know your name — but your words are forever seared on my soul. Words that should be required reading for men and women of all ages.

Words that I wish with all of my heart you never had to write.

I am in awe of your courage for speaking out — for so clearly naming the wrongs that were done to you and so passionately asserting your equal claim to human dignity.

And I am filled with furious anger — both that this happened to you and that our culture is still so broken that you were ever put in the position of defending your own worth.

It must have been wrenching — to relive what he did to you all over again. But you did it anyway, in the hope that your strength might prevent this crime from happening to someone else. Your bravery is breathtaking.

You are a warrior — with a solid steel spine.

I do not know your name — but I know that a lot of people failed you that terrible January night and in the months that followed.

Anyone at that party who saw that you were incapacitated yet looked the other way and did not offer assistance. Anyone who dismissed what happened to you as “just another crazy night.” Anyone who asked “what did you expect would happen when you drank that much?” or thought you must have brought it on yourself.

You were failed by a culture on our college campuses where one in five women is sexually assaulted — year after year after year. A culture that promotes passivity. That encourages young men and women on campuses to simply turn a blind eye.

The statistics on college sexual assault haven’t gone down in the past two decades. It’s obscene, and it’s a failure that lies at all our feet.

And you were failed by anyone who dared to question this one clear and simple truth: Sex without consent is rape. Period. It is a crime.

I do not know your name — but thanks to you, I know that heroes ride bicycles.

Those two men who saw what was happening to you — who took it upon themselves to step in — they did what they instinctually knew to be right.

They did not say “It’s none of my business.”

They did not worry about the social or safety implications of intervening, or about what their peers might think.

Those two men epitomize what it means to be a responsible bystander.

To do otherwise — to see an assault about to take place and do nothing to intervene — makes you part of the problem.

Like I tell college students all over this country — it’s on us. All of us.

We all have a responsibility to stop the scourge of violence against women once and for all.

I do not know your name — but I see your unconquerable spirit.

I see the limitless potential of an incredibly talented young woman — full of possibility. I see the shoulders on which our dreams for the future rest.

I see you.

You will never be defined by what the defendant’s father callously termed “20 minutes of action.”

His son will be.

I join your global chorus of supporters, because we can never say enough to survivors: I believe you. It is not your fault.

What you endured is never, never, never, NEVER a woman’s fault.

And while the justice system has spoken in your particular case, the nation is not satisfied.

And that is why we will continue to speak out.

We will speak to change the culture on our college campuses — a culture that continues to ask the wrong questions: What were you wearing?

Why were you there? What did you say? How much did you drink?

Instead of asking: Why did he think he had license to rape?

We will speak out against those who seek to engage in plausible deniability. Those who know that this is happening, but don’t want to get involved. Who believe that this ugly crime is “complicated.”

We will speak of you — you who remain anonymous not only to protect your identity, but because you so eloquently represent “every woman.”

We will make lighthouses of ourselves, as you did — and shine.

Your story has already changed lives.

You have helped change the culture

You have shaken untold thousands out of the torpor and indifference towards sexual violence that allows this problem to continue.

Your words will help people you have never met and never will.

You have given them the strength they need to fight.

And so, I believe, you will save lives.

I do not know your name — but I will never forget you.

The millions who have been touched by your story will never forget you.

And if everyone who shared your letter on social media, or who had a private conversation in their own homes with their daughters and sons, draws upon the passion, the outrage, and the commitment they feel right now the next time there is a choice between intervening and walking away — then I believe you will have helped to change the world for the better.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/tomnamako/j...lgE#.cqa2Gpza1

This post has since been reported and has been removed by Facebook, but look at this.

If you do not believe that a rape culture persists in our society, please explain this to me.

Dutch woman convicted in Qatar after reporting rape to police
Tourist sentenced for having sex outside marriage after being drugged and raped
about 8 hours ago

A 22-year-old Dutch holidaymaker has been convicted by a court in Qatar of having sex outside marriage after she reported to police that she’d been drugged and raped.

The woman, who has been named only as “Laura” from Utrecht, was given a one-year jail sentence suspended on condition that she doesn’t offend again during the next three years. She was also fined 3,000 Qatari riyals or about €750.

The court in the capital, Doha, also ordered on Monday that the woman be deported back to the Netherlands once her fine was paid.

Laura’s mother said she was delighted. “She’s been convicted but she’s coming home. That’s the most important thing now. I’m so relieved.”

Laura had been held since she first went to the police on March 14th, but her case only came to light at the weekend when her family decided to go public – alleging that nobody from the embassy had been to visit her for three weeks after she was detained.

Dutch reluctance

As a result, foreign minister Bert Koenders has been under pressure from MPs to make a statement explaining his department’s apparent reluctance to get involved. The assault allegedly took place after Laura went for an evening out at the Crystal Lounge in the Doha Hotel.

She said the next morning she woke up in a strange apartment and realised she’d been drugged first and later raped. She said she’d had flashbacks of leaving the hotel in a taxi with “an Arab man”.

That man turned out to be a Syrian national named Omar Abdullah al-Hassan, who afterwards claimed that the sex had been consensual but that there had been an argument following which Laura had gone to the authorities and falsely claimed she’d been raped.

Critics say the Dutch case raises questions about how Qatar will deal with the thousands of tourists planning to attend the 2022 World Cup.


http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world...lice-1.2683297

juror who served in the Brock Turner case had some strong words for Judge Aaron Persky: “Shame on you.”

The male juror, who chose to remain anonymous, recently sent a letter to Persky expressing his “shock” and disappointment at the judge’s “lenient” sentencing of Turner, the ex-Stanford swimmer convicted of sexual assault.

The letter was obtained and printed in full by Palo Alto Weekly. http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2...e-shame-on-you

“After the guilty verdict I expected that this case would serve as a very strong deterrent to on-campus assaults, but with the ridiculously lenient sentence that Brock Turner received, I am afraid that it makes a mockery of the whole trial and the ability of the justice system to protect victims of assault and rape,” the letter read. “It seems to me that you really did not accept the jury’s findings. We were unanimous in our finding of the defendant’s guilt and our verdicts were marginalized based on your own personal opinion.”

In the letter to Persky, the unnamed juror in the Turner case slammed the judge for perpetuating a culture that fails to protect survivors of sexual assault.

“Justice has not been served in this case,” the juror wrote. “The jury’s verdict of guilt on all three felony counts of sexual assault was completely disregarded in an effort to spare the perpetrator a ‘hardship.’ What message does this send to Emily Doe, and indeed all victims of sexual assault and rape, especially those on college campuses? Your concern was for the impact on the assailant. I vehemently disagree, our concern should be for the victim.”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/...b0e4fe51439b00

Uploaded: Mon, Jun 13, 2016, 2:28 pm

Brock Turner juror to judge: 'Shame on you'

Juror sends letter saying, 'Justice has not been served'

by Elena Kadvany / Palo Alto Weekly


"Absolutely shocked and appalled" -- that's the reaction of a juror in the Brock Turner sexual-assault case to the sentence handed down by Judge Aaron Persky on June 2. The male juror, speaking publicly for the first time, delivered a cutting letter to Persky on Saturday stating, "This punishment does not fit the crime."

This juror in the case of the former Stanford University student-athlete, who was found guilty on March 30 of three felony sexual-assault charges, provided the letter to the Palo Alto Weekly. He has requested to remain anonymous to protect his privacy. The Weekly met with the juror on Sunday to confirm his identity as a juror on the case by inspecting his court-issued attendance certificate. He is the only one of the 12 jurors to make a public statement about the case.

"After the guilty verdict I expected that this case would serve as a very strong deterrent to on-campus assaults, but with the ridiculously lenient sentence that Brock Turner received, I am afraid that it makes a mockery of the whole trial and the ability of the justice system to protect victims of assault and rape," the juror wrote to Persky. "Clearly there are few to no consequences for a rapist even if they are caught in the act of assaulting a defenseless, unconscious person."

"It seems to me that you really did not accept the jury's findings. We were unanimous in our finding of the defendant's guilt and our verdicts were marginalized based on your own personal opinion," the letter said.

The juror told the Weekly in an interview that he was surprised by Persky's sentence — six months in county jail (which could be reduced to three under normal county practices) and three years' probation — and considered it an affront to the jury.

"To be honest, I felt that the judge had just ignored much of what the jurors said," he told the Weekly.

Turner, now 20, was a freshman at Stanford and All-American swimmer on Jan. 18, 2015, when two graduate students found him on top of an unresponsive, partly dressed young woman lying behind a Dumpster outside a fraternity house on campus. Turner testified during the trial that the woman had verbally, willingly consented to the sexual activity, while witnesses -- the graduate students, law enforcement officers and emergency responders -- said that she was unresponsive.

Persky explained at the sentencing that his decision to impose a lighter sentence than the prosecution had asked for stemmed from positive character letters written on behalf of Turner from his family members and friends, Turner's lack of a prior record and the fact that he was intoxicated at the time of the assault.

The juror, however, said he did not find Turner credible because his story "seemed to change quite a bit."

Evidence that was not introduced during the trial but that was released by the county last week — such as text messages and photos indicating repeated drug use, in contrast to Turner's claims that he was new to the college drinking culture when he arrived at Stanford — further underscored Turner's lack of credibility, the juror said.

"I think it raises into question his testimony," he said.

One of the most compelling pieces of evidence presented during the trial, in this juror's eyes, was the fact that Turner ran away after two Stanford graduate students noticed him on top of an unmoving woman and asked loudly, "What the f— are you doing?" Both of those students testified during the trial that they chased Turner, one tackling him to the ground and holding him until the police arrived.

Another was an incoherent voicemail the woman in the case, Emily Doe (whose name has been changed to protect her privacy), left her boyfriend just minutes before meeting Turner at the campus fraternity party. The prosecution played the voicemail in court to illustrate her state of intoxication at the time and to argue that Turner should have reasonably known she was not able to give consent. In it, Doe is almost entirely incomprehensible, her words slow and slurred.

"We looked at the whole weight of the evidence, but I think those (pieces of evidence) were particularly impactful," he said.

He also commented on the 12-page letter Doe wrote to Persky, which she read in part at the June 2 sentencing and which has since drawn international attention.

"I think it was very powerful. It exemplified the impact it had on her," he said, referring to both the assault and criminal proceedings.

Persky, who has served on the bench since former Gov. Gray Davis appointed him in 2003, is now facing a recall campaign and a national debate among legal experts on whether removal of a judge is an appropriate response.

The juror, who said he had recently become an American citizen after living in the country for more than 30 years, said he does not know enough about the recall process to say whether he supports it but noted he's seen in news reports that Persky is already facing backlash in the courtroom. Last week, during jury selection for a misdemeanor stolen property case, several prospective jurors refused to serve with Persky as the judge.

"This was my first experience as a juror, and frankly I am disappointed," the juror wrote Persky.

The juror declined to answer any questions about jury deliberations. (After a trial ends, jurors are free under California law to discuss the case and deliberations with anyone, including the media, if they choose to do so.)

Like others across the country, the juror worried that Persky's "lenient sentence" will not act as a deterrent for other perpetrators of sexual violence and "will make these victims less willing to report their attacks."

"The jury's verdict of guilt on all three felony counts of sexual assault was completely disregarded in an effort to spare the perpetrator a 'hardship,'" he wrote to Persky. "What message does this send to Emily Doe, and indeed all victims of sexual assault and rape, especially those on college campuses?"

Read his letter in full below.

———

To Judge Aaron Persky:

I was a juror in the Brock Turner trial. I have to be honest and say that I was not happy that I was selected for the jury given my work responsibilities, but once I was in the box, I took my civic responsibility very seriously.

Personally I have absolutely no doubt that Mr. Turner is guilty as charged and as convicted on all three counts. The predominantly male jury reached consensus of guilt on all three counts within two days of deliberation. In light of that quick and decisive finding, I was absolutely shocked and appalled when I heard on June 2 about the minimal sentence you announced that Mr. Turner would serve for this crime. After the guilty verdict I expected that this case would serve as a very strong deterrent to on-campus assaults but with the ridiculously lenient sentence that Brock Turner received, I am afraid that it makes a mockery of the whole trial and the ability of the justice system to protect victims of assault and rape. Clearly there are few to no consequences for a rapist even if they are caught in the act of assaulting a defenseless, unconscious person.

I recently became an American citizen after being in the country for over 30 years. This was my first experience as a juror and frankly I am disappointed.

Although I wasn't in the court for the sentencing, you were reported as having said:

"A prison sentence would have a severe impact on him ... I think he will not be a danger to others."

Isn't that the point ... a sentence should have a severe impact on Mr. Turner just as the event for which he has never expressed sorrow or regret has had on Ms. Doe. Also, given Mr. Turner's complete lack of credibility, I certainly would not assume that he will not be of danger to others. Witnesses describe his predatory behavior both the evening of the assault and on at least one other previous occasion, which is evidence of a pattern of dangerous behavior.

It was also reported that you acknowledged the difficulty of trying to balance the jury's guilty verdict with your belief in the events as Mr. Turner described them. A jury of 12 people found Mr. Turner guilty of three charges, but you, despite the information that came to light during the trial and the subsequent sentencing memos filed by both sides, chose to disregard the jury's findings and other evidence and believe the defendant's self-serving version of events. And you disregarded the findings that he had lied about prior alcohol and drug use in high school. You chose to find the defendant credible on the basis of irrelevant character witness testimony; I find that impossible to understand.

During the sentencing, you said, "The trial is a search for the truth. It's an imperfect process. But after the trial all sides should accept the jury's findings." It seems to me that you really did not accept the jury's findings. We were unanimous in our finding of the defendant's guilt and our verdicts were marginalized based on your own personal opinion.

You had to justify that there were "unusual circumstances" to give Mr. Turner less than the two year minimum sentence for his crime. But the unfortunate fact is, these circumstances are not unusual. Women like Ms. Doe suffer daily from similar crimes and I fear your sentence will make these victims less willing to report their attacks.

This punishment does not fit the crime. Mr. Turner, convicted of 3 felony counts of sexual assault, will serve 3 months in county jail since he is scheduled to be released on September 2. And Mr. Turner is going to appeal the verdict, which not only is a complete waste of tax payers' money but could mean, if he gets off, that he will not even have to register as a sex offender. How unjust would that outcome be, the slate wiped clean for a 3-count convicted sex offender?!

Justice has not been served in this case. The jury's verdict of guilt on all three felony counts of sexual assault was completely disregarded in an effort to spare the perpetrator a 'hardship'. What message does this send to Emily Doe, and indeed all victims of sexual assault and rape, especially those on college campuses? Your concern was for the impact on the assailant. I vehemently disagree, our concern should be for the victim.

Shame on you.

A Concerned Juror

Former Student Charged With Two College Rapes Gets Probation After Plea Agreement
Ronn Blitzer 8 hrs ago

A man who was charged with raping two women while at Indiana University was sentenced to probation after spending one day in jail, WXIN reported. http://fox59.com/2016/06/24/former-i...-of-probation/

John Enochs was accused of raping a woman at the Delta Tau Delta fraternity house on the Indiana University campus in April 2015. A woman had told police she had been raped but did not know her attacker. She said that he held her down even though she told him to stop more than once. She later managed to get away, but health workers found that she suffered injuries to her genitals. Security footage showed her enter a room with Enochs, and she left after 24 minutes, according to police.

While authorities looked into that case, they discovered a victim from another case from 2013, who identified Enochs as her attacker. After examining DNA evidence and hearing from witnesses, police arrested Enochs for that case as well.

In the end, however, Enochs only spent one day in jail, pleading guilty to a misdemeanor charge of battery with moderate bodily injury. Prosecutors dismissed both rape charges. Enochs was sentenced to probation on Thursday.

This comes soon after another college rape case resulted in a probation sentence, with Brock Turner being convicted of three sexual assault felonies with a sentence of six months in jail, followed by probation. The difference with this case, however, is that Enochs was not actually convicted of any sex crimes.

Prosecutors have not given details as to why they agreed to dismiss the rape charges, but according to ABC News http://abcnews.go.com/US/student-cha...ry?id=40137628 a statement issued on Enochs’ behalf maintains that he is innocent of those allegations. “As the Monroe County prosecutors’ office has acknowledged through their voluntary dismissal of the rape charges, John Enochs did not rape anyone and he should never have been charged with these offenses, ” the statement said. It also alleged that alcohol was part of what led to confusion, and the woman involved in the 2015 incident acknowledged she had been drinking on the night in question, ABC News reported.

Enochs’ statement blamed the lead investigator in the case for presenting “false and misleading evidence” and not “provid[ing] the Court with exculpatory evidence.”

On June 16, the woman, going by the name Jane Doe, filed a lawsuit against Indiana University and the Delta Tau Delta fraternity. The lawsuit makes claims under Title IX, saying that the school and the fraternity ignored Enochs’ history of sexual assault, citing the alleged 2013 incident.

You can read that lawsuit : Enochs Lawsuit by tom cleary https://www.scribd.com/doc/316790312/Enochs-Lawsuit