Stanford Swimmer Convicted Of Raping Unconscious Woman Receives Short Sentence

Brock Turner, the Stanford University swimmer who was convicted of raping an unconscious woman last January, was given what many consider to be a slap on the wrist for his crime-a six-month sentence.

According to reports, the prosecutors recommended that 20 year old Turner serve six years, but Judge Aaron Persky felt that a longer sentence would “have a severe impact on him.” The ruling ignited the ire of many online.

Turner’s father gave a statement in court in which he asked the jury to only give his son probation for his offense. Dan A. Turner thinks that jail time would be a “steep price to pay for 20 minutes of action out of his 20 plus years of life.”

Turner’s victim, a woman whose identity has been withheld from the public, gave a powerful and emotional statement in court addressing Turner directly. The transcript has since gone viral. She describes how she thinks Turner’s extra curricular activities are being used “to cancel out all the sickening things that’ve happened.” She also spoke of how it felt to be “re-victimized” by the defense.

“I was pummeled with narrowed, pointed questions that dissected my personal life, love life, past life, family life, inane questions, accumulating trivial details to try and find an excuse for this guy who had me half naked before even bothering to ask for my name,” she says.

A petition titled “Remove Judge Aaron Persky from the bench for his decision in Brock Turner case” has been created on Change.org. At the time of this post, the petition had received 41, 730 signatures and once it reaches 50, 000 it will be delivered to the California State House and Senate.