Florida State Settles Suit Over Jameis Winston Rape Inquiry

Submitted by Matt on Tue, 2016-01-26 16:31

Story here. Excerpt:

'Florida State University agreed on Monday to pay $950,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by a former student who accused the former Seminoles football star Jameis Winston of raping her in 2012.

The settlement also commits Florida State to five years of sexual assault awareness programs and to the publishing of annual reports on those programs, although the university did not admit liability. Winston was never criminally charged in the case, in part, the local prosecutor acknowledged, because a number of shortcomings in the police investigation left him without the evidence needed to sustain a charge of rape.

Because of the publicity it generated, the Winston case became a centerpiece for a national debate over two intertwined issues: how universities handle allegations of sexual assault, and whether colleges and the police afford special treatment to athletes accused of misconduct. A New York Times examination — based on police and university records, as well as interviews with people close to the case, including lawyers and sexual assault experts — found that Florida State and the Tallahassee police had done little to determine what happened in the Winston case.'

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Recently I was switching channels and caught a few minutes of CNN's "The Hunting Ground" the part I saw was about the Winston rape case. Here is what I learned

When I got to the show, the girl was already explaining in her own voice how she was in the cab. I'm not sure if she was leaving from a house party or a club (but based on a comment she later says, I'm pretty sure it was a club).

She does not seem to know the guys who were in the cab (since I missed the first few minutes of her story, I'm not sure how they happened to be in the cab with her)

She is very drunk and only remembers bits and pieces of the cab ride, and only remembers voices -that's how she knows men were in the cab (she described them as sounding like black guys), the cab stops, the guys help her out. She thinks she is at her place. The next thing she remember is a guy h*ving sex with her, they are in an apartment. She is trying to fend him off. She remembers another guy coming into the room and tries to tell the guy to stop h*ving sex with her. The guy gets irritated with the other guy trying to stop him so he takes her to the locked bathroom to finish sex with her. Then he asks her if she needs a ride home. She does. She is still drunk and now she just wants home. When she gets home, she texts a friend and tells her what happened. The friend calls police and she is taken to hospital, interviewed, filed a report, performs rape kit where they obtain DNA, etc. She thinks an investigation has started - it didn't.

At that point, if her case had been investigated, they could have found the cab driver and got testimony, probably got an address for the apartment, they could have gone back to the venue and watched camera footage, interviewed people, etc. They likely would have come up with a name of the suspect or figured out who the friend was who tried to stop it, but they didn't do any of that.

Then sometime later, it is the start of a new school quarter. She is in her new class, and just before the bell, a black student walks in and sits down. She believes it is her rapist. The professor calls role out loud, and for the first time she hears his name. She immediately takes the info to the police. At some point they obtain Winston's DNA, and it is a match!

Still no further investigation, she then finds out that the police investigator, is affiliated with the college and specifically with the football team. he should have removed himself from the case in the very beginning.

Anyway, if someone presents new details I might change my opinion, but for now, I side with the girl.

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Submitted by Kris on Tue, 2016-01-26 22:27