In March of 2006, an exotic dancer accused three men on a lacrosse team of sexually assaulting her during a party. As of April 10, all charges have been dropped.
What transpired over the course of the year that the investigation was taking place is stuff of Hollywood movies. It included everything from racial tensions, to a corrupt District Attorney, to rich white kids, to media frenzy and, to top it all off, it happened at one of the most prestigious universities in the world. Let us assume someone bought the rights to put the story on the big screen. Here is how it would unfold.
Every good action movie needs an opening party scene – thus, we have the beginning of the story, a party with college guys and two strippers. We learn that these boys are all very wealthy and a little rambunctious, added to the fact that they all play lacrosse at a major university. From here, a Hollywood film would cut to two days later, with police leading the three suspects away in handcuffs as innocent bystanders look on. The three suspects would be the protagonists, innocent young adults who were wrongfully accused and later cleared.
In any good movie, there is always a woman who believes in the protagonist, even when the whole world is against him. That role could be played by the girlfriend of one of the players.
At this point in the story, we get to meet our antagonist, the corrupt District Attorney, Mike Nifong, a man hell-bent on getting a conviction for the sole purpose of getting re-elected.
Nifong will have to have an accomplice – perhaps the president of Duke University will consent to the role. From here on, we get to see all the missteps that the DA commits on his way to being ousted as the lead prosecutor.
At some point in the movie, we get to see the accuser. Her life is now miserable due to the fact that everyone recognizes her. Her life is getting picked apart by defense attorneys, everything that she has done wrong is aired in the public forum.
In the movie, we see her desperately going from friend to friend, trying to escape her past, wishing that she hadn’t started this whole storm.
Could this actually happen? Seeing how even minor human-interest pieces are made into movies now, don’t be surprised if this becomes a major motion picture. Will it be fair? No. Do people even want to see it? After all, one of those boys could’ve been you.
This is the second recent high-profile rape case that has been thrown out due to discrepancies in the story of the accuser. Both the Kobe Bryant case and the Duke rape case have set rape prevention back. No longer are people automatically willing to believe the victim. This might be the sad legacy of this case. Hopefully, it won’t prevent anyone who was actually a victim of sexual assault from coming forward and receiving justice.
Maystrovsky is a member of the class of 2009.
