A high profile sexual assault case that headlined the media has come to a conclusion.
The defendant, Matthew Barnett, who was facing felony sexual assault charges, pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of misdemeanor child endangerment.
The victim, Daisy Coleman, “blacked out” during the incident and does not remember much. This led to difficulties in obtaining evidence to convict Barnett for felony sexual assault.
After the encounter between Coleman and Barnett, Coleman was left unconscious in her front yard in freezing temperatures. Daisy was 13 years old at the time of the incident and Barnett was 17 years old.
Megan Selheim, the Coordinator of the STOP Violence Coordinator, said “While we have made a lot of progress in addressing sexual assault charges in criminal courts in the US, it still can be very difficult to get a conviction at a trial.”
Prosecutors do the best they can to get a consequence for the perpetrator in any given case, and plea deals can lead to a better overall outcome than going to trial for such cases.
These plea deals can guarantee the defendant will be charged with something. When going to trial, the defendant has the opportunity to get acquitted.
Another consideration is that trials can be very traumatic for the victims to go through. The victim would have to recount the assault and go through every detail. They are often asked to testify what happened to them. The defense also has the chance to go through their testimony and question the validity of their statements.
Prosecutors must take this into question when deciding whether or not to take the cases to trial.
However, a trial does allow a victim to confront their attacker in a public setting and tell them what they have done to their face.
“Even if you do have a consensual encounter, do you then dump the person on their front lawn in freezing temperatures,” said Selheim, “elements like that can really color how people think it should be treated.”
Selheim also said that Coleman is very brave to go public with the case. She said that survivors of sexual assault very often are terrified that they are going to be blamed for what happened.
According to Selheim, it is common human behavior to look back on a situation and think about what could have been done differently to avoid the negative outcome.
People have a tendency to do that when they’re a victim of any sort of crime. “The difference there is, what causes sexual assault to happen is a criminal, not any of the decisions the victim made,” said Selheim.
The STOP violence program offers crisis support and advocacy. People can stop by the office located at 118 Knight Hall and have confidential conversations about what happened to them. The STOP Violence also does education and awareness on sexual violence.
There are various events around campus being put on by STOP.
Other local programs involved with sexual assault are the SAFE Project, and the UWPD’s Rape Aggression Defense Systems (RADS), which trains women how to defend themselves.
