Calif. town rattled by alleged rape of girl, 15

[TxEMTP69]

http://www.kristv.com/Global/story.asp?S=11395055

RICHMOND, Calif. (AP) - The gang rape and beating of a 15-year-old girl on school grounds after her homecoming dance was horrific enough. But even more shocking, police say, was that up to two-dozen people watched and did nothing to stop it.
The attack over the weekend rattled this crime-ridden city of 120,000 in the San Francisco Bay area, where one police official called it one of the most heinous crimes he has ever seen. Some students have already left the school in response to the attack.
"It's not safe there at all," said 16-year-old Jennie Steinberg, whose mother let her transfer out of the school Tuesday. "I'm not going back."
The victim, a sophomore, had left the dance and was drinking alcohol in a school courtyard with a group when she was attacked, police said.
Two suspects were in custody Monday, but police said as many as seven ranging in age from 15 to mid-20s attacked the girl for more than two hours at a dimly lit area near benches Saturday night. As many as two-dozen people saw the rape without notifying police.
Officers found the girl semiconscious and naked from the waist down near a picnic table. She remains hospitalized with non-life threatening injuries.
"This was a barbaric act. I still cannot get my head around the fact that numerous people either watched, walked away or participated in her assault," Lt. Mark Gagan said Tuesday. "It's one of the most disturbing crimes in my 15 years as a police officer."
Gagan would not comment on rumors that observers took video of the attack on cell phones and may have posted it online.
Manuel Ortega, a 19-year-old former student, was arrested after trying to flee the scene. He is being held on $800,000 bail for investigation of rape and robbery. Attempts to reach Ortega at the jail Tuesday were unsuccessful.
A 15-year-old student also was booked late Monday on one count of sexual assault, Gagan said.
Late Tuesday, SWAT teams were preparing to make more arrests as police are also offering a $20,000 reward they hope will bring more people forward with any information.
Even though he said as many as two-dozen people were witnesses, Gagan said officials are still trying to determine the exact number of people involved.
"I'm confident that the list will expand and at the end of our investigation we will get a clear indication of who was there and who did what," Gagan said.
The attack occurred in a city that has dealt with its share of vicious crimes in recent years, and the school recently approved surveillance cameras after a series of violent crimes. In one case a few years back, a student was shot outside the school, ran inside and died in the then-principal's hands, said Marin Trujillo, a spokesman for the West Contra Costa Unified School District.
Richmond is an industrialized conclave near the San Francisco Bay that is known as one of the nation's most dangerous cities. In 2007, Richmond had 47 homicides, and the murder rate led the state for cities with populations of 100,000 or more, surpassing Los Angeles and Oakland.
That number dropped to 27 in 2008 but has spiked to 44 killings so far this year, amid drug dealing and gang activity that has engulfed the town, Gagan said.
Gagan said the girl left the dance and was walking to meet her father for a ride home when a classmate invited her to join a group drinking in the courtyard. The girl had consumed a large amount of alcohol by the time the assault began, police said. Gagan said the girl's father tried to call her cell phone, but no one answered.
Gagan said police received a tip about a possible assault on campus from a young woman who heard two males bragging about it. She was found nearly an hour after the dance, which more than 400 people attended, had ended.
Neil Smelser, a professor emeritus of sociology at the University of California-Berkeley, said Tuesday that the incident could be categorized as "bystander indifference."
"The questions become, 'Why didn't they do something moral to stop an immoral situation? Why didn't they behave morally by calling the police, telling school officials?'" said Smelser, who has written extensively on collective behavior.
"It's very likely that they didn't have any emotional or social ties to the victim," Smelser continued. "If they had any linkage to her, then maybe we'd have a different outcome."
Trujillo said there were four police officers and 15 school site supervisors monitoring the dance. He said there were no problems during the dance inside the school gym, calling it "a success." He said two site supervisors were allowed to leave because they felt they had enough security inside.
But Trujillo called the rape outside on school grounds a "tragic incident."
"We wished this had never happened. This was such a heinous crime," Trujillo said. "We are all going to learn from this."
Student Joseph Machado, 16, said the mood inside Richmond High School on Tuesday was tense as officers were questioning fellow students. Two squad cars were parked outside the main entrance, and school security teams were patrolling the grounds in golf carts.
"Some of my friends were saying, 'What if that happened to me?'" said Machado, whose parents didn't allow him to go to the dance. "This school, this city already has a bad reputation and now this makes it worse."

[KellyAsh]

Fry those pieces of garbage...kids or not, they deserve death.

[High-Cap 1911]

buckshot, slug, buckshot ...... to the groins of those who committed the crime.

then a slow and agonizing death, much like the situation she felt.





i don't take lightly those who are too chicken shit to go and get shot down time and time again, they just go and take it from some girl....i'm guessing mommy didnt love them as a kid.

be a man and know what no means a couple of dozen times before you prove you are a chicken shit little bastard and don't listen to when someone says no.

[oldguy]

Parts of society have degraded into animal behavior and perhaps worse then animal therefore they should be treated as such.

[DCortez]

One bullet is cheaper than a life time of counseling.

[cuate]

Prison in Kalifornia ? So overcrowded they are having to release the thugs to make more room, the criminals run the show, Ayran Brotherhood, Mexican Mafia, Black Whatevers, the scene much worse than on the street with the gangbangers shooting at each other. Bring back public hangings !!

[MadMo44Mag]

None of this will ever change until all the bleeding heart liberals have been victimized and their eyes opened to the fact that criminal behavior is a CHOICE not an illness!!!
My solution to prison over crowding is cheap and simple.
Fence a large area in the desert, place all convicts of violent crime inside the fenced zone; once a week air drop just enough food and water for half the population.
Soon the problem will take care of itself!!!

[TxEMTP69]

Originally Posted by DCortez

One bullet is cheaper than a life time of counseling.

+100 but I do like slow agonizing death option also. Get some sick twisted SOB to kill them in a fashion close to their crime

[oldguy]

It would seem to me we need more severe punishment and in a shorter period of time after the crime.

[KellyAsh]

Originally Posted by MadMo44Mag

None of this will ever change until all the bleeding heart liberals have been victimized and their eyes opened to the fact that criminal behavior is a CHOICE not an illness!!!
My solution to prison over crowding is cheap and simple.
Fence a large area in the desert, place all convicts of violent crime inside the fenced zone; once a week air drop just enough food and water for half the population.
Soon the problem will take care of itself!!!

I love this idea! The only thing I would change is I wouldnt give them any food just a couple of knives, a few matches and some wood. Let them kill and eat each other till there's only one left then shoot him.