More Proof We Just Don’t Care About Sexual Assault in the U.S.
Three teens who admitted to attacking and photographing an unconscious 15-year-old girl have been sentenced to mere days in a California juvenile detention center while their victim hanged herself eight days after the assault.
Sheila Pott next to a portrait of her daughter Audrie in Los Altos, Calif. (AP/Marcio Jose Sanchez)
Three teens who admitted to attacking and photographing an unconscious 15-year-old girl are going to spend only 30-45 days in a California juvenile detention center. The victim, Audrie Pott, hanged herself eight days after the assault after learning about the photos being spread around her high school.
Two of the culprits will have to spend only weekends at the center, and to top it all off, the three continued their “slut-shaming” tactics by circulating pictures of other naked girls after Pott’s suicide. What is wrong with our legal system when it can’t even find an adequate punishment for such despicable acts?
Al-Jazeera America:
The San Francisco Chronicle reported that Pott hanged herself on September 10, 2012 in the bathroom at her mother’s house.
She had gone to a party eight days beforehand, drunk alcohol and fallen asleep.
She woke up without her shorts on and with “mocking words” written in several places on her body, the Chronicle said.
During the course of the week, she learned that photographs had been taken of her during the assault and shared through text messages with other students, her family said.
Lawrence and Sheila Pott, her parents, have sued the three boys.
On Tuesday the parents’ lawyer Robert Allard said: “As much as we strongly disagree with and are actively attempting to change the lenient privacy laws afforded to juveniles, even when they commit as here heinous acts on an unconscious minor, we cannot publicly comment on any aspect of any criminal proceedings involving these young men.”
—Posted by Natasha Hakimi
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