In recent weeks, the public has become nearly hysterical over the perceived lenient sentencing of Brock Allen Turner, the Stanford student convicted of sexually assaulting a blacked out party-goer behind the dumpster of a fraternity house. Turner was convicted of assault with intent to commit rape of an intoxicated woman, sexually penetrating an intoxicated person with a foreign object, and sexually penetrating an unconscious person with a foreign object. He was sentenced to 6 months in prison with probation. He will have to register as a sex offender upon release.
Facebook is replete with strong opinions a plenty from people who think the sentence too lenient, but who seem to have picked up only fragments of the story. But is the public outrage based on fact or on raw emotion, internet memes, or incomplete retellings of the events that led to Turner’s conviction?
The Turner case has all the ingredients to create an emotional national outrage. A talented young white male at an exclusive university with a bright future ahead; a young woman found unconscious behind a dumpster, bleeding; a “foreign object” inserted inside the woman and pine needles covering her hair. No doubt, this story provides what the nation has been waiting for. The case provides the final evidence for the deep and evil corruption of the white male, the systemic chauvinism of this country’s most prestigious institutions, and the racist bias of our legal system. It seems, for a moment, that our country is united around a consensus that portrays Turner as a vicious animal – the malicious privileged white male to liberals, the bathroom molester waiting in the wings to conservatives. But few of those participating in the online lynching of Turner and demanding the head of the judge who imposed the sentence actually know many facts of the event.
Scouring the web, it is astonishing how few details emerge. We find out that both Turner and the victim were highly intoxicated with alcohol. We learn from Turner’s testimony that he and the victim had been “dancing and kissing,” which may or may not be true. At some point, the victim’s alcohol level made her fall unconscious for about five hours, during which time some of the events in question occurred. We learn that the attempted sex occurred behind a dumpster, that the victim lay half naked and unconscious with her legs spread out, that witnesses saw Turner “thrusting” himself on the immobile woman, and that, according to the police report, she was “covered in pine needles.” We learn that a “foreign object” inserted in the woman’s vagina was, in fact, Turner’s hand.
From this, it seems Turner indeed committed the crimes of which he was convicted – attempting to have sex with an unconscious person is never justifiable. But, based on the review of the evidence, he was not found guilty of rape – a fact that seems lost on all those who post his picture under the word “rapist.”
Some important questions remain unanswered: What was the nature of Turner’s and the victim’s interaction at the party? Why did they end up behind a dumpster? Who removed the victim’s underwear? At what point did the victim fall unconscious? Did she fall unconscious at about the same time that the two witnesses arrived? Had she participated in the sexual activity until that point? Was Turner aware of her falling unconscious? Had he gone as far as opening his own pants?
Given the evidence and the verdict, Turner’s sentence seems just. He will pay his debt to society with six months in jail, three years of probation, and a lifetime of being a “sex offender” for his crime. But the nation seems to ask for more, carried away by raw emotion, rather than by the facts. Judge Aaron Persky has received death threats and Turner’s friends who came forward as character witnesses on Turner’s behalf have experience hateful online harassment and have been branded as rape apologists. The band of one of his witnesses (Leslie Rasmussen) was forced to shut down its social media accounts and website due to the barrage of attacks. The nation is moved to hysteria not on the basis of evidence, but on the basis of an obsession with white male privilege, with race, with gender and with exploitation.
Are we being fair? We are certainly not being merciful.
