<p>Can you not read? The FBI was alerted. They have jurisdiction </p>
<p>Just asking: why am I only seeing anything about this on aljazeera?</p>
<p>The case was reported to the police, and the prosecutor felt there wasn’t sufficient evidence to make a case. Even given that the article is really written from only one point of view, it’s not to hard to understand why. There was little evidence of lack of consent, other than the statements of the accuser, and the accused had a witness to back up part of his story. Also, the prosecutor realized that the accuser’s story would be weakened by the fact that she originally blamed an intruder, when in fact she had sneaked out of her room and was talking to the accused in his bed at the time of the incident. And all of this is in an article which is really only presenting her side of the story.</p>
<p>It may well be that the case was mishandled, and that the school in particular didn’t follow up appropriately. But that doesn’t alter the fact that a criminal case would be very hard to make with this set of facts.</p>
<p>This is actually the first time I had heard of this case.
Since the rape took place on a field trip, away from the city, I expect the parents did not know who to report it to, and since they had been notified that their daughter was being taken to a hospital, that they assumed that all the proper authorities had been alerted.
Unfortunately, this is far from the only case in this district.
It is also telling that the local papers did not report it, although they had the same information as AlJazeera.</p>
<p>It was a good class and I liked the teacher, however, it was percieved as the lower level science offering for this grade, and as this is an " inner city" school, most of the students were African American ( as was the superintendent at the time, as is the then & current principal).
I wonder if the district would have been so fast to dismiss it, if her parents had the wherewithal to hire an investigator or if she had been in one of the science classes for the kids considered to be on the college track.</p>
<p>If they don’t have enough chaperones, they shouldnt be taking the field trip.
I also chaperoned on an 8th grade overnight field trip with my daughters class.
13 yr olds going on 17. Poor judgement up the wazoo.
They also snuck out at night, but they did so enmasse, apparently thinking if the lights were out, I was asleep.
[-(
Yeah, right.
You should have seen their faces when I confronted them in the bathroom, where they went to primp before they met the boys.</p>
<p>I really do not understand how this boy could have admitted his guilt, but not be punished.
At the very least, the district should have paid for this families pain and suffering.</p>
<p>The statements about what the boy admitted are paraphrases made by the author of the article. This is the kind of thing that bothers me–once we’ve read this article, we think we know the facts about this case. Maybe we do. But if the facts are more complicated, we may never learn about them, and this goes in the memory bank as the case in which the girl was raped on a field trip and nobody cared.</p>
<p>Okay. Well, honestly, if I send my kid on a high school field trip, I have a right to expect she won’t be having anal sex in an unsupervised situation. The school is negligent.</p>
<p>
With that I totally agree. I note that the boy had been in trouble before, for having sex with a girl in the bushes (apparently not a rape case, though). Where was the supervision?</p>
<p>At least at colleges, we understand that adult supervision is limited.</p>
<p>Since this case was in a national park, the FBI had jurisdiction.
I wouldnt have known that.</p>
<p>There were 43 sexual assaults in Seattle public schools, and the families gave up.
I know the feeling.
We gave up trying to make them follow special education law and I was involved enough to be the chair of the parent group.
But we didn’t have the money to hire an outside attorney, which is what the district counts on.
They have had to pay out money when a teacher assaults a student, so you would think they would be more proactive, but this district has no institutional memory.</p>
<p>Links to advocacy groups.
<a href=“Resources for victims of sexual assault and campus safety advocates | Al Jazeera America”>http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/america-tonight/america-tonight-blog/2013/10/28/help-and-resourcesforvictimsofsexualassault.html</a></p>
<p>EK, re Garfield- only aljazeera and muckraker, no one else picked it up. ? Are you locally familiar with this story? And the local papers around HWS did report. </p>
<p>This is what is being said about the local paper.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>It takes years for it to go through the courts and some families may opt to not make their child relive the experience.
I don’t know how the local papers makes it decisions what to write about.</p>
<p>This is not a “he said/she said” case, and neither is the Hobart one. These both have measurable signs of traumatic rape.</p>
<p>The commonality is administrators making excuses for popular athletes. I’m sure my sons would have been put in jail if they ever behaved like this. </p>
<p>Right, Magnetron. And I keep thinking of the winning football record. No one wanted to jeopardize THAT! </p>
<p>Why are you complaining about Al Jazeera @lookingforward? They are as good a source as any. </p>
<p>I think you make a good point @magnetron. And, since we well know what the signs are of traumatic rape, we don’t have to keep acting as if we need a witness. If you have strangulation marks on your neck, nobody asks if you wanted them. They investigate. </p>
<p>This “there’s no proof she didn’t want to have anal sex” in a public room with strangers argument is just bizarre. </p>
<p>Vaginal trauma? Signs of rape. </p>
<p>I thought it was bizarre also - wasn’t there some guy friend that she texted and was with her when she went to the hospital? I need to go back and re-read that NYTs articles, I’m getting facts mixed up with other articles, but I thought in the HWS case there was some sort of witness. </p>
<p>Yes, a football player that interrupted the rape in public but did not want to testify. He knew he would never play football again if he reported against teammates.</p>
<p>But if the girl would have pressed charges, I’m sure the DA would have or could have subpoenaed him if it would have supported her case. If I recall he didn’t want to participate in the Title IX adjudication. </p>
<p>Given that the statute of limitations had in no way run out on the rape, there is no issue nor should there be an issue, with a traumatized survivor waiting six months to decide to press charges. You try getting raped that way at 18 and see how long it takes to get to the point where you are healed enough to testify. </p>
<p>I reject that premise entirely. </p>
<p>All women should reject that premise and all men. Police should investigate a rape and collect all evidence, regardless of what a survivors original reaction is. There is a healing process and most will want to testify somewhere down the road. The rape survivor needs time to heal at first. We can give them that. The evidence will still be good in six to twelve months. </p>
<p>Which makes sense, which makes me wonder why the DA isn’t interested in the case. </p>