Rape by San Diego State Football Players 10 Months Ago Still Has Gone Unpunished

The following is based on news accounts but edited on the premise that the victim, her family and friends are telling the truth.

Close to Halloween last year in October 2021, a then 17-year old woman, as yet publicly identified, was out with friends on a Saturday night. She wore a costume. They had heard about a night house party so she and her friends decided to check it out.

Once at the party, she either began or continued to drive alcohol and was intoxicated. At some point, she was approached by a man who made small talk and offered her a drink. He then led her to a room.

Other men were there. She was then thrown face down on a bed. Several men sexually assaulted her while she fell in and out of consciousness. Her belly and nose piercings were ripped out.

Who were the men? They were football players at San Diego State University. She had been gang-raped.

She stumbled out of the bedroom, bloodied and bruised.

“I was super out of it. I was crying. I had blood all over my face and body and costume,” she told her friends, who peppered her with questions. She told them she had been raped.

Her friends took her home. That was Saturday night. On Monday, a friend accompanied her to a police station where she called the non emergency dispatch line and was placed on hold. It took four hours before an officer responded. But, at least, “The officer I talked to was actually amazing, so kind and so very supportive,” she said.

The San Diego Union-Tribune reported this past Sunday, Aug. 7:

She turned over her costume and underwent a “really traumatizing” rape exam — swabs and flash pictures and videos, tests for pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.

She used the officer’s phone to call her father and ask him to come to Rady Children’s Hospital. When he got there, she told him why. “To see my dad freaked out in tears after giving him that news was really, really rough,” she said.

The rape was on Saturday. By Tuesday, the victim’s father spoke with a University Police Department official about the rape. Because of this communication, the father believed he was reporting it. Later, SDSU denied the father had actually filed an official police report at the time.

The U-T:

On Oct. 19, San Diego police told university officials they were investigating the off-campus incident and asked the school to hold off on any internal inquiries for fear of compromising the criminal investigation. The school agreed to stand down.

The U-T:

She cooperated with the police investigation. She underwent the intensity of a rape exam. She saw a therapist, she journaled, she switched her senior year of high school from on-campus to virtual. She said she developed an eating disorder.

And she waited.

Since then – nearly ten months now – there has been no punishment for the rapes. No one has been arrested. No one yet knows whether criminal charges will be filed. And the rapists are still walking around – threats to any other unsuspecting women. Plus, innocent players may be under suspicion by their schoolmates.

The Aztec football team went on to have a winning season with a record 12 to 2 tally. And apparently, the team is seeking greater heights.

In late July, the young woman, now 18, went public with her assertions. She was afraid the whole assault was being buried.

On Monday the first of August, the school said it would open its own administrative inquiry. Thursday, August 4, San Diego police submitted their nine month investigation to the District Attorney’s Office to review.

The time is now.

Actually, it’s past time.