Lesbian's brutal gang rape investigated in Calif.
http://www.mercedsunstar.com/216/story/606723.html (http://www.mercedsunstar.com/216/story/606723.html)
12/22/2008
SAN FRANCISCO -- A woman in the San Francisco Bay area was jumped by four men, taunted for being a lesbian, repeatedly raped and left naked outside an abandoned apartment building, authorities said Monday.
Detectives say the 28-year-old victim was attacked Dec. 13 after she got out of her car, which bore a rainbow gay pride sticker. The men, who ranged from their late teens to their 30s, made comments indicating they knew her sexual orientation, said Richmond police Lt. Mark Gagan.
This depresses me so much. This is one of my biggest fears, being harassed by guys for being gay. Being in NYC has made me feel safe, but if this can happen in San Francisco, it can happen here, too.
I hope they catch the bastards who did this to her and this doesn't become just another unsolved hate crime everyone conveniently forgets.
:(
It didn't happen in San Francisco, it happened in Richmond, home of the Chevron and other refineries, most major street gangs, and the highest murder rate in Cali.
Nor is Richmond known for 'solving' crimes.
I find it so difficult to understand what kind of thinking makes some men all over the world believe that raping a homosexual person, whether lesbian, gay, or trans, will make them become straight.
I don't think they do think that, they are punishing them, not curing them.
Quote from: tekla on December 23, 2008, 12:54:06 AM
It didn't happen in San Francisco, it happened in Richmond, home of the Chevron and other refineries, most major street gangs, and the highest murder rate in Cali.
Nor is Richmond known for 'solving' crimes.
The perfect place to advertise the rainbow sticker. Why not wear a kick me sign?
This crime most likely would have happened no matter what kind of sticker she had on that car.
Quote from: tekla on December 23, 2008, 04:37:21 PM
I don't think they do think that, they are punishing them, not curing them.
I think you should read some of the rape accounts then.
Well you're hard pressed, because no rational mind could ever conceive of that working, but your not dealing with rational minds. But in this case, it was just pure hate. Wrong night, wrong fight, wrong part of town in a place where just about every block is the wrong part of town.
Quote from: lisagurl on December 23, 2008, 04:41:02 PM
Quote from: tekla on December 23, 2008, 12:54:06 AM
It didn't happen in San Francisco, it happened in Richmond, home of the Chevron and other refineries, most major street gangs, and the highest murder rate in Cali.
Nor is Richmond known for 'solving' crimes.
The perfect place to advertise the rainbow sticker. Why not wear a kick me sign?
Should she have peeled the sticker off her car before she went into the place? Come
on.
I think she lived there.
'Blaming the victim' is still not right. I know, we should all just hide who we are and pretend to be something we're not, to appease homophobes and ensure nothing bad ever happens to us. How dare she put a rainbow sticker on her own car? She should have known that doing so would lead to this?
When I lived in NYC it was common sense to avoid ruff parts of town especially alone. It was also common sense not to wear your colors outside your own area. Since when is not having common sense blaming the victim? Maybe Darwin was right. Most criminals are caught because of being dim witted. Many people get into problems for the same reasons.
Well the number of murders and rapes in Richmond is far higher than one. Oh, those were Hispanics, or African-Americans. So it's like that kid in Flordia, or the one girl who went missing on Aruba or something. It only makes the news, when the victim is white and they have some big cause attached to it.
Rape is not about curing, it is about a misplace belief of power. Only cowards rape and it doesn't make a damn about who the victim is. They pick someone they feel is weaker and can't fight back.
The victim in this case had every right to be where she was, when she was and to have anything on her car that she wants. I will not second guess her. But when and if they ever catch those b*****ds, I hope the castrate them.
Janet
Quote from: tekla on December 23, 2008, 12:54:06 AM
It didn't happen in San Francisco, it happened in Richmond, home of the Chevron and other refineries, most major street gangs, and the highest murder rate in Cali.
Nor is Richmond known for 'solving' crimes.
Ah, yes. Good ol' Richmond. A friend of mine's car broke down there once, and as he was trying to figure out how he was going to get home, passers by kept saying, "You better be out of here before it gets dark, man." He said he felt safer when his band's van broke down in a bad part of Detroit. I think I'd rather live on the streets in SF, than in a house in Richmond. :icon_no:
I think I'd rather live on the streets in SF, than in a house in Richmond.
That's about it. Even with the money that Chevron pays people to live there. (True, because living that close to a refinery has long term health impacts Chevron gives the people like $150 each year and a card that says "Sorry you're going to die young")
I'd bet I could take people from the worst areas of Detroit, Jersey, New York City, LA - and they would be afraid in Richmond.
Janet Lynn hit on the real issue involved here or in any rape situation, its a POWER thing for the rapist, NOT about sex or gender. Some one presenting in any way with a power that they feel is greater than theirs is a potential victim. Just being happy and confident about yourself is an invitation to an opportunistic attack from a rapist. Add what I suspect, but is not in the original post, that the rapists were using drugs or alcohol to "feel good" in a group, and there is the situation. Richmond CA or Grovers Corners NH, is also not the issue, any good place can have bad people, and any terrible place can have their saints. Molestation is the same thing, as I know only too well the hard way ( a teenager older and bigger than I was ) and I was on a Boy Scout camping trip when that happened, presenting as a Boy Scout.
When I was first working as a deputy court clerk in the Los Angeles courts system, I was in a court room one day when a man who was being arraigned on rape charges was wheeled in in a wheelchair. His victim had defended herself successfully with her gym bag. She was a women's shotput athlete from a local high school and had an 8# steel shot in it. It was put several inches below the attackers belly button. He was still sentenced to the MAX on 4 counts.
Richmond CA or Grovers Corners NH,
Huge difference, I'm sure that people in Grovers Corners are not be shot at the rate of 38 out of every 100,000. This is not America as your used to it, unless you've spend a lot of nights in Compton, or the Bronx, it's a surreal landscape where violence is pretty much the common currency.
The city has in recent years suffered from a high crime rate, so serious that the city council at one point requested a declaration of a state of emergency and asked for the intervention of the Contra Costa County Sheriff and the California Highway Patrol in order to ameliorate crime waves.[46] Murder, vehicle theft and larceny rates are all high, although they tend to be concentrated in certain areas such as the Iron Triangle and areas surrounding adjacent unincorporated North Richmond, which is outside the jurisdiction of the Richmond Police Department.
In 2004, Richmond was statistically the second most dangerous city in California, surpassing Oakland and was named the 8th most dangerous city in the country.[47] However, those rankings have changed and Richmond is now the third most dangerous in California behind Compton and Oakland and 11th most dangerous nationally according to the Morgan Quitno rankings.[48] For every 100,000 people there were 38.3 murders, 50.4 rapes, 485.8 robberies, 512 assaults, 1110.7 burglaries, 3497.4 counts or larceny and 2471.4 thefts of vehicles.[12] Richmond had 42 murders in 2006; and the city experienced a record of 62 homicides in 1991.[49]
A lot of this is about power, true, but its not just some women's studies male power trip, its the power of drugs, money, highly organized crime and territory.
Quote from: tekla on December 24, 2008, 10:52:31 AM
"the power of drugs, money, highly organized crime and territory."
Well it's still about power then isn't it? It all sounds pretty much the same. I really never understood the allure of that kind of stuff though. I find it truly puzzling.
What is it that the Glen Frey song says 'the lure of easy money has a very strong appeal' - and if you don't get what's going on with all that, then you don't understand the scope and the amount of money going down. Biggest cash business in the world, and they just looking for their piece of it, not like there are a lot of other options in Richmond.
Compton CA, ahh yes. :( Not too many nights recently (about 3 years) but the days over nearly 40 years of administrative law enforcement work are too many to specifically remember, and I grew up in Comption's next door city to the north. I have been in Richmond too in recent years and drive with both car doors locked, and few if any second thoughts about running red lights (with only minimal concern for crosswalk contents) if I feel threatened.
I can grudgingly see the money issue of power in the drugs, since I have interviewed a great many people in the drug business over the years. (My interest in the interviews is not academic, just a monthly paycheck which the governor is reducing by 10% in February.) A high level drug trafficker will not however, find his power in rape. He's addicted to the power and almost never uses his junk. Rape is an addiction to a different type of power, but it is likely to be committed by one of the drug executive's ultimate customers either under the influence of the drugs, or out of desperation for a fix.
I unfortunately, for the same paycheck, have had to interview rapists, child molesters, and people who have violently abused other family members. I don't interview them about their business as a rapist, molester or abuser, since those are not businesses. My interest in them is to find out when, if ever they will pay certain debts to the State of CA. Drug and alcohol addicts in this group are common. Non-addicts with other social issues of powerlessness are there too. I have had threats from this group, but rarely from the high level drug executives. ??? (Drug and power addiction folks have been less than 20% of the people I have worked with over the years, so you can see that I have been VERY busy getting to know people during my working life.)
Grover's Corner's NH, is a fictional, idyllic town that was created by the playwrite Thornton Wilder, as the site of his play Our Town which is one of my favorite theater "fixes". Could a rape occur there? No, because Wilder did not have one happen in his play. Was there an alcohol related problem there? Yes, because one of the characters in it was found dead from freezing to death while intoxicated. Could someone write a play with a place like Grover's Corner's as the site for a rape? I can't think of the title of it, but one has been written or will be shortly!!!
This post is not to defend the reputation of Richmond, but just to note a sad fact that whether we are gay, lesbian, trans, or straight, we can all be victims of someone who feels worse about themselves that we do. I don't understand that any more than I really understand my own transgender feelings, I know it happens. :'( That's all.
Oh no doubt, and a lot of the people here have not been in, or near - and they ought to be thanking god for it too - places like the bad parts of Richmond or Compton. I know, I lived in Iowa and those sorts of stories seemed almost surreal, but when I lived in Oakland, they were things that happened on the other side of the lake, where I jogged, and that makes a difference.
few if any second thoughts about running red lights (with only minimal concern for crosswalk contents) if I feel threatened.
Ahh, that's Richmond. And there are not that many people in crosswalks. Not that many people out on the street at all, none that you would want to meet.
They have arrested some suspects. :)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090101/ap_on_re_us/lesbian_rape;_ylt=Ak7ZZXCURneO4n4uwN511kGs0NUE (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090101/ap_on_re_us/lesbian_rape;_ylt=Ak7ZZXCURneO4n4uwN511kGs0NUE)
They have arrested all of them, two were 15 and 16. Pictures of the other two are up. Gang bangers.