The media lately has been going on about a case that for a while, seems as if it hasn't been very prevalent in the news.
If you haven't been in the loop, here's what you've missed in the Brock Turner case:
In January of 2015, a woman, who is choosing to remain unidentified to the press, was found unconscious behind a dumpster, clothes disheveled, and her dress pulled up above her waist after last being seen at a college party. After medical treatment, they found that not only had she been physically assaulted, but sexually, as there were bruises both throughout her body and along her pelvic area, pine needles (yes, from trees) all in her hair and inside of her vagina, and had been penetrated by something (later confirmed to be the defendant's fingers). This case was brought to trial because clearly something was not right and if there was consent is a major issue.
In addition to consent, there is the issue of "is this consent plausible, if it's there."
Enough with trying to be objective, because quite frankly, I'm fuming about this case.
On June 7th, the court decided that after convicting Brock Turner of three counts of felony charges, that he would receive such a harsh punishment: a six-month jail sentence, with probation.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
Oh there's more... He will forever be a registered sex offender.
GOOD.
Turner deserved that and so much more. He was convicted of three felony charges. He does not deserve a slap on the wrist. He was convicted of :
1. Assault with intent to commit rape of an intoxicated woman.
2. Sexually penetrating an intoxicated person with a foreign object.
3. Sexually penetrating an unconscious person with a foreign object.
I'm not sure on this, but I feel as though cat burglars that get caught receive longer jail sentences than that.
If you've read my previous articles, you know that I'm biased to an incident like this, but the general public should be outraged at the sentencing as well. The news won't even refer to him as a rapist. I'm fairly certain if consent wasn't given, it's rape or at the very, very, very least sexual assault.
I didn't realize that being a star athlete in college mitigated that factor.
The victim courageously wrote about her story and how she was constantly re-victimized throughout the trial. So not only did she have to find out what happened to her at the same time the rest of the world did, but she found out the same way, through social media, and then went through the court having the defense attorney attack her.
"What did you wear, how much did you drink", were questions she was berated with. I'm sorry, I didn't know drinking too much meant that it was okay to have sex with someone, especially while they were unconscious. I didn't know that having a cardigan cover one's shoulders meant "that she was asking for it".
Just in case you're not following my sarcasm: IT DOESN'T.
The court system and the way this trial was handled put this poor girl through hell. She wrote in her letter that was posted onto Buzzfeed,"By definition rape is not the absence of promiscuity, rape is the absence of consent, and it perturbs me deeply that he can’t even see that distinction."
She also learned that the only reason he did not get the opportunity to have sex with her, was because two Swedish men came over and stopped it. Rather, they tackled Turner off of her because they saw that she was unresponsive.
She wrote in the same letter to her attacker that, "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."
Still think he isn't a rapist now Judge Persky and the media?
He still only deserves six months in prison for basically taking this entire woman's life away in a matter of 20 minutes. Victims of rape and sexual assault lose pieces of themselves when the attack happens. Then, they often lose pride, a sense of independence, and take extra caution to live their lives in a manner that will keep them from reliving the incident.
She wrote in her same letter, "I was not only told that I was assaulted, I was told that because I couldn’t remember, I technically could not prove it was unwanted. And that distorted me, damaged me, almost broke me. It is the saddest type of confusion to be told I was assaulted and nearly raped, blatantly out in the open, but we don’t know if it counts as assault yet. I had to fight for an entire year to make it clear that there was something wrong with this situation."
A writer for the NY Daily News shares their animosity towards the sentencing by saying that in comparison, their friend received 10 years in prison for selling marijuana. I didn't realize marijuana traumatized people, considering that buying it and smoking it is a choice the person is making. I didn't realize that distributing took away the basic right of safety from the buyer, or victim. I didn't realize that it deserved a punishment far worse than that of rape, sexual assault. In all honesty, him leaving her there unconscious was leaving her on death's doorstep. I didn't realize that it meant that Brock Turner deserved a tiny fraction of the punishment of selling marijuana.
This poor girl was re-victimized every day in court. Pictures that were taken of her at the hospital were used as evidence. She listened to Turner say that "he too was intoxicated", an attempt to take the blame away from him. She has to endure the defense attacking her with questions. She never once got to hear the defendant take responsibility for what he did. He never once admitted guilt or that anything that he did was wrong.
Most people fail to see that when cases like this go to trial, the victim is constantly forced to relive what happened to them, publicly, and in a very traumatizing manner. We often forget about the victim's feelings, and her writing this letter gives a great insight for members of society to understand a fraction of what she is going through.
Then she had to listen to this slap on the wrist sentencing. It's, honestly, a slap in the face to all victims of sexual assault, and a slap in the face to all women, or even men, who have been touched in ways they didn't wish to be.
Another reason to be outraged at this entire case: Aaron Persky, the presiding judge, played D1 Lacrosse at Stanford University when he was an undergraduate student according to NBC News. That's a major conflict of interest and reason he never should've been working on this case to begin with. Brock Turner is a star D1 athlete at Stanford- the same university. By definition, conflict of interest in the eyes of the State Court of California say that, "A person subject to this rule (recusal) has an interest that is in substantial conflict with the proper discharge of his or her duties in the public interest and of his or her responsibilities as prescribed by the laws of this state, or a personal interest," I'm fairly certain being an alumni and star athlete of the same school the defendant is a star athlete at is a substantial conflict and should've been taken as a personal interest.
It's also reason I'm closing this article by urging the readers to sign this petition to remove him as a judge:
