Vicious Assault Shakes Texas Town
By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.
Published: March 8, 2011
Michael Stravato for The New York Times
The exterior of an abandoned trailer where an 11-year-old girl was assaulted. Eighteen suspects were held.
CLEVELAND, Tex. — The police investigation began shortly afterThanksgiving, when an elementary school student alerted a teacher to a lurid cellphone video that included one of her classmates.
The video led the police to an abandoned trailer, more evidence and, eventually, to a roundup over the last month of 18 young men and teenage boys on charges of participating in the gang rape of an 11-year-old girl in the abandoned trailer home, the authorities said.
Five suspects are students at Cleveland High School, including two members of the basketball team. Another is the 21-year-old son of a school board member. A few of the others have criminal records, from selling drugs to robbery and, in one case, manslaughter. The suspects range in age from middle schoolers to a 27-year-old.
The case has rocked this East Texas community to its core and left many residents in the working-class neighborhood where the attack took place with unanswered questions. Among them is, if the allegations are proved, how could their young men have been drawn into such an act?
“It’s just destroyed our community,” said Sheila Harrison, 48, a hospital worker who says she knows several of the defendants. “These boys have to live with this the rest of their lives.”
The attack’s details remained unclear. The police have declined to discuss their inquiry because it is continuing. The whereabouts of the victim and her mother were not made public.
The allegations first came to light just after Thanksgiving, when a child who knows the victim told a teacher she had seen a videotape of the attack on a cellphone, said Stacey Gatlin, a spokeswoman for the Cleveland Independent School District.
The school district’s security department interviewed the girl, 11, who is a student at Cleveland Middle School, and her mother. The security department determined that a rape had taken place, but not on school property, and then handed the matter over to the police, Ms. Gatlin said.
On Dec. 9, the police obtained a search warrant to go through a house on Travis Street and a nearby trailer that had been abandoned for at least two years. An affidavit filed to support the search warrant said the girl had been forced to have sex with several men in both places on Nov. 28 and cited pictures and videos as proof, according to The Houston Chronicle.
The affidavit said the assault started after a 19-year-old boy invited the victim to ride around in his car. He took her to a house on Travis Street where one of the other men charged, also 19, lived. There the girl was ordered to disrobe and was sexually assaulted by several boys in the bedroom and bathroom. She was told she would be beaten if she did not comply, the affidavit said.
A relative of one of the suspects arrived, and the group fled through a back window. They then went to the abandoned mobile home, where the assaults continued. Some of those present recorded the sexual acts on their telephones, and these later were shown among students.
Residents in the neighborhood where the abandoned trailer stands — known as the Quarters — said the victim had been visiting various friends there for months. They said she dressed older than her age, wearing makeup and fashions more appropriate to a woman in her 20s. She would hang out with teenage boys at a playground, some said.
“Where was her mother? What was her mother thinking?” said Ms. Harrison, one of a handful of neighbors who would speak on the record. “How can you have an 11-year-old child missing down in the Quarters?”
Cleveland, a town of 9,000, lies about 50 miles northeast of Houston in the pine country, near the picturesque Sam Houston National Forest. The town’s economy has always rested on timber, cattle, farming and oil. But there are pockets of poverty, and in the neighborhood where the assault occurred, well-kept homes sit beside boarded-up houses and others with deteriorating facades.
The abandoned trailer where the assault took place is full of trash and has a blue tarp hanging from the front. Inside there is a filthy sofa, a disconnected stove in the middle of the living room, a broken stereo and some forlorn Christmas decorations. A copy of the search warrant was on a counter in the kitchen next to some abandoned family pictures.
The arrests have left many wondering who will be taken into custody next. Churches have held prayer services for the victim. The students who were arrested have not returned to school, and it is unclear if they ever will. Ms. Gatlin said the girl had been transferred to another district. “It’s devastating, and it’s really tearing our community apart,” she said. “I really wish that this could end in a better light.”
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WEDNESDAY, MARCH 9, 2011
How not to cover a gang rape.
By Liliana Segura
A lot of people are understandably up in arms today about this New York Timesstory, about the horrific gang rape of an 11-year-old girl in East Texas. The crime itself is outrageous and indefensible, of course, but to add insult to injury, the story is written like so many other stories about rape: with a slanted blame-the-victim mentality.
Residents in the neighborhood where the abandoned trailer stands — known as the Quarters — said the victim had been visiting various friends there for months. They said she dressed older than her age, wearing makeup and fashions more appropriate to a woman in her 20s. She would hang out with teenage boys at a playground, some said.
“Where was her mother? What was her mother thinking?” said Ms. Harrison, one of a handful of neighbors who would speak on the record. “How can you have an 11-year-old child missing down in the Quarters?”
As many have pointed out, this has long been a sexist hallmark of rape coverage, and it continues to be. But what I also find notable is how many people who have commented on the story found this quote to be just as outrageous:
“It’s just destroyed our community,” said Sheila Harrison, 48, a hospital worker who says she knows several of the defendants. “These boys have to live with this the rest of their lives.”
As the first quote in the piece, I can see how it would enrage people whose first response would be: What about the pain endured by the young child? In a post titled “Sympathy for the Rapist” (like “Sympathy for the Devil,” get it?), Jamelle Bouie of The American Prospect echoes the sentiments of many on Twitter by labeling this “pro-rapist sympathy” on the part of the Times. “In telling the story,” he writes, “the Times reserves most of its sympathy for the victim, which isn’t unusual. Unless, of course, your ‘victims’ are the rapists themselves.”
The (alleged) rapists are described by the Times reporter as ranging from “middle schoolers to a 27-year-old,” adding that “a few…have criminal records, from selling drugs to robbery and, in one case, manslaughter.” The reporter also poses the question, on behalf of the community, “how could their young men have been drawn into such an act?”
To be clear: I completely agree that the piece “reveals the ubiquity and casual acceptance of victim-blaming,” as Bouie puts it, and for that, the Timesdeserves criticism. I also agree that the piece was strangely lacking in quotes that expressed outrage, or even sensitivity, toward the horrendous suffering endured by the young child in question. But I do not agree that quoting a member of the community when she (rightfully) points out that the men and boys who committed this crime will have to “live with (it) for the rest of their lives” amounts to sympathy. Nor do I think that asking the question “how could they do such a thing?” betrays support for rapists. (Although phrasing it as something they were “drawn into” certainly heaps more blame on the victim.)
In a less offensive version of that article, those quotes might have reminded us that the people who committed this terrible crime are, well, people—most of them probably seemingly ordinary people, and part of a community that is now in turmoil because of their extraordinarily awful actions. For most of us, the fact that unfathomably cruel acts are committed by people rather than monsters (or devils) is a hard thing to accept. We do not like to be reminded of it. But for those who know the perpetrators of violent crimes—like the woman quoted by the Times—they have no choice but to ask the question “how could they do it?” and to think of the lifelong consequences for them (and for their families). If only monsters and devils committed such crimes, no one would consider such questions. But they don’t. Men and boys do. Why they do and what to do about it are questions worth discussing.
Unfortunately, by giving its piece such an obvious blame-the-victim frame, theTimes story completely obviated those questions, so that all we end up seeing are excuses on behalf of the alleged rapists. As one Slate blogger writes, “Any attempt to gain emotional distance on rape by transferring just a tiny portion, just one percent, of the blame onto the victim is an absolute moral wrong. It subtracts from the agency of the individual doing the raping.”
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Liliana Segura
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I'm an independent journalist and editor with a focus on social justice, prisons & harsh sentencing. This blog is a work in progress. Stories I've writtenSome Facts About Me
>via: http://lilianasegura.com/post/3746476703/how-not-to-cover-a-gang-rape
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Tell the New York Times to Apologize for Blaming a Child for Her Gang Rape
On March 8th the New York Times published a story by James C. McKinley Jr. titled "Vicious Assault Shakes Texas Town." The assault it described was, indeed, heinous: an 11-year-old was gang raped in an abandoned trailer house by as many as 18 men, with suspects ranging in age from middle school students to a 27-year-old. The attack came to light because several of the suspects took cell phone video of the assault.
Also appalling was the way in which New York Times reporter James C. McKinley reported the victim blaming sentiments of members of the Texas community in which the rape occurred as truth. McKinley insinuated the young woman had it coming, writing, "They said she dressed older than her age, wearing makeup and fashions more appropriate to a woman in her 20s. She would hang out with teenage boys at a playground, some said."
Mr. McKinley also gave ink to community members who are more concerned about the impact raping a child will have on the suspects than being raped will have on the young victim. Mr. McKinley quoted Sheila Harrison as saying, "“These boys have to live with this the rest of their lives.”
1 in 4 American women will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime. A culture that blames victims for being raped - for what they were wearing, where they were, and who they were with - rather than blaming the rapist is a culture that tacitly condones rape. A society that is more concerned with how being held accountable for rape will impact the perpetrator than for the well being of the victim is a society that doesn't take rape seriously.
The New York Times contributed to this dangerous culture by publishing this article by Mr. McKinley without asking him to edit out his and community members' editorial victim blaming.
Tell the New York Times to issue a published apology for their coverage of this incident and publish an editorial from a victim's rights expert on how victim blaming in the media contributes to the prevalance of sexual assault. No one ever deserves to be raped and no victim should ever be told it was their fault. New York Times, we expect better. We demand better.
Sign the Petition
>via: http://www.change.org/petitions/tell-the-new-york-times-to-apologize-for-blam...?opt_new=t&opt_fb=t