[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 7]
[House]
[Pages 8854-8859]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




          WORDS FROM A SEXUAL ASSAULT SURVIVOR TO HER ATTACKER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 6, 2015, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Speier) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Ms. SPEIER. Mr. Speaker, we are doing something tonight that has 
never been done before on the House floor. We will read the entire gut-
wrenching statement of the sexual assault survivor who was attacked on 
the Stanford campus last year.
  The sexual predator received a paltry sentence of 6 months in county 
jail, of which he will serve only 3 for committing a violent crime. We 
are not moved by the felon's excuse of alcohol. We are not moved by the 
judge, who said a longer sentence would have a ``severe impact'' on the 
offender. We are not moved by the felon's father, who said that his son 
should not serve jail time for ``20 minutes of action.''
  Emily Doe is a survivor in every sense of the word, and her words 
deserve to be amplified.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that we read the statement in 
its entirety without yielding, by name, to each Member, to preserve the 
continuity of the reading.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentlewoman from California?
  There was no objection.
  Ms. SPEIER. ``Your Honor, if it is all right, for the majority of 
this statement I would like to address the defendant directly.
  ``You don't know me, but you've been inside me, and that's why we're 
here today.
  ``On January 17th, 2015, it was a quiet Saturday night at home. My 
dad made some dinner and I sat at the table with my younger sister who 
was visiting for the weekend. I was working full time and it was 
approaching my bed time. I planned to stay at home by myself, watch 
some TV and read, while she went to a party with her friends.''
  Ms. CLARK of Massachusetts. ``Then, I decided it was my only night 
with her, I had nothing better to do, so why not, there's a dumb party 
ten minutes from my house, I would go, dance like a fool, and embarrass 
my younger sister. On the way there, I joked that undergrad guys would 
have braces. My sister teased me for wearing a beige cardigan to a frat 
party like a librarian. I called myself `big mama', because I knew I'd 
be the oldest one there. I made silly faces, let my guard down, and 
drank liquor too fast not factoring in that my tolerance had 
significantly lowered since college.
  ``The next thing I remember I was in a gurney in a hallway. I had 
dried blood and bandages on the backs of my hands and elbow. I thought 
maybe I had fallen and was in an admin office on campus. I was very 
calm and wondering where my sister was. A deputy explained I had been 
assaulted. I still remained calm, assured he was speaking to the wrong 
person. I knew no one at this party. When I was finally allowed to use 
the restroom, I pulled down the hospital pants they had given me, went 
to pull down my underwear, and felt nothing.
  ``I still remember the feeling of my hands touching my skin and 
grabbing nothing. I looked down and there was nothing. The thin piece 
of fabric, the only thing between my vagina and anything else, was 
missing and everything inside me was silenced. I still don't have words 
for that feeling. In order to keep breathing, I thought maybe the 
policeman used scissors to cut them off for evidence.
  ``Then I felt the pine needles scratching the back of my neck and 
started pulling them out my hair. I thought maybe, the pine needles had 
fallen from a tree onto my head. My brain was talking my gut into not 
collapsing. Because my gut was saying, help me, help me.
  ``I shuffled from room to room with a blanket wrapped around me, pine 
needles trailing behind me, I left a little pile in every room I sat 
in. I was asked to sign papers that said `Rape Victim' and I thought 
something has really happened. My clothes were confiscated and I stood 
naked while the nurses held a ruler to various abrasions on my body and 
photographed them. The three of us worked to comb the pine needles out 
of my hair, six hands to fill one paper bag. To calm me down, they said 
it's just the flora and fauna, flora and fauna. I had multiple swabs 
inserted into my vagina and anus, needles for shots, pills, had a Nikon 
pointed right into my spread legs. I had long, pointed beaks inside me 
and had my vagina smeared with cold, blue paint to check for 
abrasions.''
  Mr. CICILLINE. ``After a few hours of this, they let me shower. I 
stood there examining my body beneath the steam of water and decided, I 
don't want my body anymore. I was terrified of it, I didn't know what 
had been in it, if it had been contaminated, who had touched it. I 
wanted to take off my

[[Page 8855]]

body like a jacket and leave it at the hospital with everything else.
  ``On that morning, all that I was told was that I had been found 
behind a dumpster, potentially penetrated by a stranger, and that I 
should get retested for HIV because results don't always show up 
immediately. But for now, I should go home and get back to my normal 
life.
  ``Imagine stepping back into the world with only that information. 
They gave me huge hugs and I walked out of the hospital into the 
parking lot wearing the new sweatshirt and sweatpants they provided me, 
as they had only allowed me to keep my necklace and shoes.''

                              {time}  2000

  ``My sister picked me up, face wet from tears and contorted in 
anguish. Instinctively and immediately, I wanted to take away her pain. 
I smiled at her, I told her to look at me, I'm right here, I'm okay, 
everything's okay. I'm right here.
  ``My hair is washed and clean, they gave me the strangest shampoo, 
calm down, and look at me. Look at these funny new sweatpants and 
sweatshirt, I look like a P.E. teacher, let's go home, let's eat 
something. She did not know that beneath my sweatsuit, I had scratches 
and bandages on my skin, my vagina was sore and had become a strange, 
dark color from all the prodding, my underwear was missing, and I felt 
too empty to continue to speak. That I was also afraid, that I was also 
devastated. That day we drove home and for hours in silence my younger 
sister held me.
  ``My boyfriend did not know what happened, but called that day and 
said, `I was really worried about you last night, you scared me, did 
you make it home okay?' I was horrified. That is when I learned I had 
called him that night in my blackout, left an incomprehensible 
voicemail, that we had also spoken on the phone, but I was slurring so 
heavily he was scared for me, that he repeatedly told me to go find [my 
sister]. Again, he asked me, `What happened last night? Did you make it 
home okay?' I said yes, and hung up to cry.''
  Ms. TSONGAS. ``I was not ready to tell my boyfriend or parents that 
actually, I may have been raped behind a dumpster, but I don't know by 
who or when or how. If I told them, I would see the fear on their 
faces, and mine would multiply by tenfold, so instead I pretended the 
whole thing wasn't real.
  ``I tried to push it out of my mind, but it was so heavy I didn't 
talk, I didn't eat, I didn't sleep, I didn't interact with anyone. 
After work, I would drive to a secluded place to scream.
  ``I didn't talk, I didn't eat, I didn't sleep, I didn't interact with 
anyone, and I became isolated from the ones I loved most. For over a 
week after the incident, I didn't get any calls or updates about that 
night or what happened to me. The only symbol that proved that it 
hadn't just been a bad dream, was the sweatshirt from the hospital in 
my drawer.
  ``One day, I was at work, scrolling through news on my phone, and 
came across an article. In it, I read and learned for the first time 
about how I was found unconscious, with my hair disheveled, long 
necklace wrapped around my neck, bra pulled out of my dress, dress 
pulled off over my shoulders and pulled up above my waist, that I was 
butt naked all the way down to my boots, legs spread apart, and had 
been penetrated by a foreign object by someone I did not recognize.
  ``This was how I learned what happened to me, sitting at my desk 
reading the news at work. I learned what happened to me the same time 
everyone else in the world learned what happened to me. That's when the 
pine needles in my hair made sense, they didn't fall from a tree. He 
had taken off my underwear, his fingers had been inside of me. I don't 
even know this person. I still don't know this person. When I read 
about me like this, I said, this can't be me, this can't be me. I could 
not digest or accept any of this information.''
  Ms. MAXINE WATERS of California. ``I could not imagine my family 
having to read about this online. I kept reading. In the next 
paragraph, I read something that I will never forgive; I read that 
according to him, I liked it. I liked it. Again, I do not have words 
for these feelings.
  ``It's like if you were to read an article where a car was hit, and 
found dented, in a ditch. But maybe the car enjoyed being hit. Maybe 
the other car didn't mean to hit it, just bump it up a little bit. Cars 
get in accidents all the time, people aren't always paying attention, 
can we really say who's at fault.
  ``And then, at the bottom of the article, after I learned about the 
graphic details of my own sexual assault, the article listed his 
swimming times. She was found breathing, unresponsive with her 
underwear six inches away from her bare stomach curled in fetal 
position. By the way, he's really good at swimming. Throw in my mile 
time if that's what we're doing. I'm good at cooking, put that in 
there, I think the end is where you list your extracurriculars to 
cancel out all the sickening things that've happened.
  ``The night the news came out I sat my parents down and told them 
that I had been assaulted, to not look at the news because it's 
upsetting, just know that I'm okay, I'm right here, and I'm okay. But 
halfway through telling them, my mom had to hold me because I could no 
longer stand up.
  ``The night after it happened, he said he didn't know my name, said 
he wouldn't be able to identify my face in a lineup, didn't mention any 
dialogue between us, no words, only dancing and kissing.
  ``Dancing is a cute term; was it snapping fingers and twirling 
dancing, or just bodies grinding up against each other in a crowded 
room? I wonder if kissing was just faces sloppily pressed up against 
each other? When the detective asked if he had planned on taking me 
back to his dorm, he said no. When the detective asked how we ended up 
behind the dumpster, he said he didn't know. He admitted to kissing 
other girls at that party, one of whom was my own sister who pushed him 
away. He admitted to wanting to hook up with someone. I was the wounded 
antelope of the herd, completely alone and vulnerable, physically 
unable to fend for myself, and he chose me.''
  Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. ``Sometimes I think, if I hadn't gone, then this 
never would have happened. But then I realized, it would have happened, 
just to somebody else. You were about the enter four years of access to 
drunk girls and parties, and if this is the foot you started off on, 
then it is right you did not continue. The night after it happened, he 
said he thought I liked it because I rubbed his back. A back rub. Never 
mentioned me voicing consent, never mentioned us even speaking, a back 
rub. One more time, in public news, I learned that my ass and vagina 
were completely exposed outside, my breasts had been groped, fingers 
had been jabbed inside me along with pine needles and debris, my bare 
skin and head had been rubbing against the ground behind a dumpster, 
while an erect freshman was humping my half naked, unconscious body. 
But I don't remember, so how do I prove I didn't like it.
  ``I thought there's no way this is going to trial; there were 
witnesses, there was dirt in my body, he ran but he was caught. He's 
going to settle, formally apologize, and we will both move on. Instead, 
I was told he hired a powerful attorney, expert witnesses, private 
investigators who were going to try and find details about my personal 
life to use against me, find loopholes in my story to invalidate me and 
my sister, in order to show that this sexual assault was in fact a 
misunderstanding. That he was going to go to any length to convince the 
world he had simply been confused.
  ``I was not only told that I was assaulted, I was told that because I 
couldn't remember, I technically could not prove it was unwanted. And 
that distorted me, damaged me, almost broke me. It is the saddest type 
of confusion to be told I was assaulted and nearly raped, blatantly out 
in the open, but we don't know if it counts as assault yet. I had to 
fight for an entire year to make it clear that there was something 
wrong with this situation.

[[Page 8856]]

  ``When I was told to be prepared in case we didn't win, I said, I 
can't prepare for that.''
  Ms. JUDY CHU of California. ``He was guilty the minute I woke up. No 
one can talk me out of the hurt he caused me. Worst of all, I was 
warned, because he now knows you don't remember, he is going to get to 
write the script. He can say whatever he wants and no one can contest 
it. I had no power, I had no voice, I was defenseless. My memory loss 
would be used against me. My testimony was weak, was incomplete, and I 
was made to believe that perhaps, I am not enough to win this. His 
attorney constantly reminded the jury, the only one we can believe is 
Brock, because she doesn't remember. That helplessness was 
traumatizing.
  ``Instead of taking time to heal, I was taking time to recall the 
night in excruciating detail, in order to prepare for the attorney's 
questions that would be invasive, aggressive, and designed to steer me 
off course, to contradict myself, my sister, phrased in ways to 
manipulate my answers. Instead of his attorney saying, Did you notice 
any abrasions? He said, You didn't notice any abrasions, right? This 
was a game of strategy, as if I could be tricked out of my own worth.
  ``The sexual assault had been so clear, but instead, here I was at 
the trial, answering questions like:
  ``How old are you? How much do you weigh? What did you eat that day? 
Well what did you have for dinner? Who made dinner? Did you drink with 
dinner? No, not even water? When did you drink? How much did you drink? 
What container did you drink out of? Who gave you the drink? How much 
do you usually drink? Who dropped you off at this party? At what time? 
But where exactly? What were you wearing? Why were you going to this 
party?
  ``What'd you do when you got there? Are you sure you did that? But 
what time did you do that? What does this text mean? Who were you 
texting? When did you urinate? Where did you urinate? With whom did you 
urinate outside? Was your phone on silent when your sister called? Do 
you remember silencing it? Really? Because on page 53 I'd like to point 
out that you said it was set to ring. Did you drink in college? You 
said you were a party animal? How many times did you black out? Did you 
party at frats?''
  Ms. ESHOO. ``Are you serious with your boyfriend? Are you sexually 
active with him? When did you start dating? Would you ever cheat? Do 
you have a history of cheating? What do you mean when you said you 
wanted to reward him? Do you remember what time you woke up? Were you 
wearing your cardigan? What color was your cardigan? Do you remember 
any more from that night? No? Okay, well, we'll let Brock fill it in.
  ``I was pummeled with narrow, 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. After a 
physical assault, I was assaulted with questions designed to attack me, 
to say see, her facts don't line up, she's out of her mind, she's 
practically an alcoholic, she probably wanted to hook up, he's like an 
athlete right, they were both drunk, whatever, the hospital stuff she 
remembers is after the fact, why take it into account, Brock has a lot 
at stake so he's having a really hard time right now. And then it came 
time for him to testify and I learned what it meant to be revictimized.
  ``I want to remind you, the night after it happened he said he never 
planned to take me back to his dorm. He said he didn't know why we were 
behind a dumpster. He got up to leave because he wasn't feeling well 
when he was suddenly chased and attacked. Then he learned I could not 
remember. So one year later, as predicted, a new dialogue emerged. 
Brock had a strange new story, almost sounded like a poorly written 
young adult novel with kissing and dancing and hand holding and 
lovingly tumbling onto the ground, and most importantly in this new 
story, there was suddenly consent. One year after the incident, he 
remembered, oh yeah, by the way she actually said yes, to everything, 
so.
  ``He said he had asked if I wanted to dance. Apparently I said yes. 
He'd asked if I wanted to go to his dorm, I said yes. Then he asked if 
he could finger me and I said yes. Most guys don't ask, can I finger 
you? Usually there's a natural progression of things, unfolding 
consensually, not a Q and A. But apparently I granted full permission. 
He's in the clear. Even in his story, I only said a total of three 
words, yes yes yes, before he had me half naked on the ground.''

                              {time}  2015

  Mr. TAKANO. ``Future reference, if you are confused about whether a 
girl can consent, see if she can speak an entire sentence. You couldn't 
even do that. Just one coherent string of words. Where was the 
confusion? This is common sense, human decency.
  ``According to him, the only reason we were on the ground was because 
I fell down. Note; if a girl falls down help her get back up. If she is 
too drunk to even walk and falls down, do not mount her, hump her, take 
off her underwear, and insert your hand inside her vagina. If a girl 
falls down help her up. If she is wearing a cardigan over her dress 
don't take it off so that you can touch her breasts. Maybe she is cold, 
maybe that's why she wore the cardigan.
  ``Next in the story, two Swedes on bicycles approached you and you 
ran. When they tackled you why didn't you say, 'Stop! Everything's 
okay, go ask her, she's right over there, she'll tell you.' I mean you 
had just asked for my consent, right? I was awake, right? When the 
policeman arrived and interviewed the evil Swede who tackled you, he 
was crying so hard he couldn't speak because of what he'd seen.
  ``Your attorney has repeatedly pointed out, well we don't know 
exactly when she became unconscious. And you're right, maybe I was 
still fluttering my eyes and wasn't completely limp yet. That was never 
the point. I was too drunk to speak English, too drunk to consent way 
before I was on the ground. I should never have been touched in the 
first place. Brock stated, `At no time did I see that she was not 
responding. If at any time I thought she was not responding, I would 
have stopped immediately.'
  ``Here's the thing; if your plan was to stop only when I became 
unresponsive, then you still do not understand. You didn't even stop 
when I was unconscious anyway! Someone else stopped you. Two guys on 
bikes noticed I wasn't moving in the dark and had to tackle you. How 
did you not notice while on top of me?
  ``You said, you would have stopped and gotten help. You say that, but 
I want you to explain how you would've helped me, step by step, walk me 
through this. I want to know, if those evil Swedes had not found me, 
how the night would have played out.''
  Mrs. DINGELL. ``I am asking you; Would you have pulled my underwear 
back on over my boots? Untangled the necklace wrapped around my neck? 
Closed my legs, covered me? Pick the pine needles from my hair? Asked 
if the abrasions on my neck and bottom hurt? Would you then go find a 
friend and say, Will you help me get her somewhere warm and soft? I 
don't sleep when I think about the way it could have gone if the two 
guys had never come. What would have happened to me? That's what you'll 
never have a good answer for, that's what you can't explain even after 
a year.
  ``On top of all this, he claimed that I orgasmed after 1 minute of 
digital penetration. The nurse said there had been abrasions, 
lacerations, and dirt in my genitalia. Was that before or after I came? 
To sit under oath and inform all of us, that yes I wanted it, yes I 
permitted it, and that you are the true victim attacked by Swedes for 
reasons unknown to you is appalling, is demented, is selfish, is 
damaging. It is enough to be suffering. It is another thing to have 
someone ruthlessly working to diminish the gravity of validity of this 
suffering.
  ``My family had to see pictures of my head strapped to a gurney full 
of pine needles, of my body in the dirt with my

[[Page 8857]]

eyes closed, hair messed up, limbs bent, and dress hiked up. And even 
after that, my family had to listen to your attorney say the pictures 
were after the fact, we can dismiss them. To say, yes her nurse 
confirmed there was redness and abrasions inside her, significant 
trauma to her genitalia, but that's what happens when you finger 
someone, and he's already admitted to that.
  ``To listen to your attorney attempt to paint a picture of me, the 
face of girls gone wild, as if somehow that would make it so that I had 
this coming for me. To listen to him say I sounded drunk on the phone 
because I'm silly and that's my goofy way of speaking. To point out 
that in the voicemail, I said I would reward my boyfriend and we all 
know what I was thinking. I assure you my rewards program is 
nontransferable, especially to any nameless man that approaches me.''
  Ms. KAPTUR. ``He has done irreversible damage to me and my family 
during the trial and we have sat silently, listening to him shape the 
evening. But in the end, his unsupported statements and his attorney's 
twisted logic fooled no one. The truth won, the truth spoke for itself.
  ``You are guilty. Twelve jurors convicted you guilty of three felony 
counts beyond a reasonable doubt, that's twelve votes per count, 
thirty-six yeses confirming guilt, that's one hundred percent, 
unanimous guilt. And I thought finally it is over, finally he will own 
up to what he did, truly apologize, we will both move on and get 
better. Then I read your statement.
  ``If you are hoping that one of my organs will implode from anger and 
I will die, I'm almost there. You are very close. This is not a story 
of another drunk college hook-up with poor decision making. Assault is 
not an accident. Somehow, you still don't get it. Somehow, you still 
sound confused. I will now read portions of the defendant's statement 
and respond to them.
  ``You said, Being drunk I just couldn't make the best decisions and 
neither could she.
  ``Alcohol is not an excuse. Is it a factor? Yes. But alcohol was not 
the one who stripped me, fingered me, had my head dragging against the 
ground, with me almost fully naked. Having too much to drink was an 
amateur mistake that I admit to, but it is not criminal. Everyone in 
this room has had a night where they have regretted drinking too much, 
or knows someone close to them who has had a night where they regretted 
drinking too much. Regretting drinking is not the same as regretting 
sexual assault. We were both drunk. The difference is I did not take 
off your pants and underwear, touch you inappropriately, and run away. 
That's the difference.
  ``You said, If I wanted to get to know her, I should have asked for 
her number, rather than asking her to go back to my room.
  ``I'm not mad because you didn't ask for my number. Even if you did 
know me, I would not want to be in this situation. My own boyfriend 
knows me, but if he asked to finger me behind a dumpster, I would slap 
him. No girl wants to be in this situation. Nobody. I don't care if you 
know their phone number or not. You said, I stupidly thought it was 
okay for me to do what everyone around me was doing, which was 
drinking. I was wrong.''
  Ms. GABBARD. ``Again, you were not wrong for drinking. Everyone 
around you was not sexually assaulting me. You were wrong for doing 
what nobody else was doing, which was pushing your erect dick in your 
pants against my naked, defenseless body concealed in a dark area, 
where partygoers could no longer see or protect me, and my own sister 
could not find me. Sipping fireball is not your crime. Peeling off and 
discarding my underwear like a candy wrapper to insert your finger into 
my body, is where you went wrong. Why am I still explaining this.
  ``You said, During the trial I didn't want to victimize her at all. 
That was just my attorney and his way of approaching the case.
  ``Your attorney is not your scapegoat, he represents you. Did your 
attorney say some incredulously infuriating, degrading things? 
Absolutely. He said you had an erection, because it was cold.
  ``You said, you are in the process of establishing a program for high 
school and college students in which you speak about your experience to 
`speak out against the college campus drinking culture and the sexual 
promiscuity that goes along with that.'
  ``Campus drinking culture. That's what we're speaking out against? 
You think that's what I've spent the past year fighting for? Not 
awareness about campus sexual assault, or rape, or learning to 
recognize consent. Campus drinking culture. Down with Jack Daniels. 
Down with Skyy Vodka. If you want to talk to people about drinking go 
to an AA meeting. You realize, having a drinking problem is different 
than drinking and then forcefully trying to have sex with someone? Show 
men how to respect women, not how to drink less.
  ``Drinking culture and the sexual promiscuity that goes along with 
that. Goes along with that, like a side effect, like fries on the side 
of your order. Where does promiscuity even come into play? I don't see 
headlines that read, Brock Turner, Guilty of drinking too much and the 
sexual promiscuity that goes along with that. Campus Sexual Assault. 
There's your first powerpoint slide. Rest assured, if you fail to fix 
the topic of your talk, I will follow you to every school you go to and 
give a follow up presentation.''
  Mr. POE of Texas. ``Lastly you said, I want to show people that one 
night of drinking can ruin a life. A life, one life, yours, you forgot 
about mine. Let me rephrase for you, I want to show people that one 
night of drinking can ruin two lives. You and me. You are the cause, I 
am the effect. You have dragged me through this hell with you, dipped 
me back into that night again and again. You knocked down both our 
towers, I collapsed at the same time you did. If you think I was 
spared, came out unscathed, that today I ride off into sunset, while 
you suffer the greatest blow, you are mistaken.
  ``My independence, natural joy, gentleness, and steady lifestyle I 
had been enjoying became distorted beyond recognition. I became closed 
off, angry, self deprecating, tired, irritable, empty. The isolation at 
times was unbearable. You cannot give me back the life I had before 
that night either. While you worry about your shattered reputation, I 
refrigerated spoons every night so when I woke up, and my eyes were 
puffy from crying, I would hold the spoons to my eyes to lessen the 
swelling so that I could see. I showed up an hour late to work every 
morning, excused myself to cry in the stairwells, I can tell you all 
the best places in that building to cry where no one can hear you.
  ``The pain became so bad that I had to explain the private details to 
my boss to let her know why I was leaving. I needed time because 
continuing day to day was not possible. I used my savings to go as far 
away as I could possibly be. I did not return to work full time as I 
knew I'd have to take weeks off in the future for the hearing and 
trial, that were constantly being rescheduled. My life was put on hold 
for over a year, my structure had collapsed.
  ``I can't sleep alone at night without having a light on, like a five 
year old, because I have nightmares of being touched where I cannot 
wake up, I did this thing where I waited until the sun came up and I 
felt safe enough to go to sleep. For three months, I went to bed at six 
o'clock in the morning.
  ``Nobody wins. We all have been devastated, we all have been trying 
to find some meaning in all of this suffering. Your damage was 
concrete; stripped of titles, degrees, enrollment. My damage was 
internal, unseen, I carry it with me. You took away my worth, my 
privacy, my energy, my time, my safety, my intimacy, my confidence, my 
own voice, until today.''

                              {time}  2030

  ``See one thing we have in common is that we were both unable to get 
up in the morning. I am no stranger to suffering. You made me a victim. 
In newspapers my name was `unconscious, intoxicated woman', ten 
syllables and, nothing more than that.

[[Page 8858]]

  ``For a while, I believed that that was all I was. I had to force 
myself to relearn my real name, my identity. To relearn that this is 
not all that I am. That I am not just a drunk victim at a frat party 
found behind a dumpster, while you are the All-American swimmer at a 
top university, innocent until proven guilty, with so much at stake. I 
am a human being who has been irreversibly hurt, my life was put on 
hold for over a year, waiting to figure out if I was worth something . 
. . I used to pride myself on my independence, now I am afraid to go on 
walks in the evening, to attend social events with drinking among 
friends where I should be comfortable being. I have become a little 
barnacle always needing to be at someone's side, to have my boyfriend 
standing next to me, sleeping beside me, protecting me. It is 
embarrassing how feeble I feel, how timidly I move through life, always 
guarded, ready to defend myself, ready to be angry.
  ``You have no idea how hard I have worked to rebuild parts of me that 
are still weak. It took me eight months to even talk about what 
happened. I could no longer connect with friends, with everyone around 
me. I would scream at my boyfriend, my own family whenever they brought 
this up. You never let me forget what happened to me.''
  Mr. SWALWELL of California. ``At the end of the hearing, the trial, I 
was too tired to speak. I would leave drained, silent. I would go home 
turn off my phone and for days I would not speak. You bought me a 
ticket to a planet where I lived by myself. Every time a new article 
came out, I lived with the paranoia that my entire hometown would find 
out and know me as the girl who got assaulted. I didn't want anyone's 
pity and am still learning to accept victim as part of my identity. You 
made my own hometown an uncomfortable place to be.
  ``You cannot give me back my sleepless nights. The way I have broken 
down sobbing uncontrollably if I'm watching a movie and a woman is 
harmed, to say it lightly, this experience has expanded my empathy for 
other victims. I have lost weight from stress, when people would 
comment I told them I've been running a lot lately. There are times I 
did not want to be touched. I have to relearn that I am not fragile, I 
am capable, I am wholesome, not just livid and weak.
  ``When I see my younger sister hurting, when she is unable to keep up 
in school, when she is deprived of joy, when she is not sleeping, when 
she is crying so hard on the phone she is barely breathing, telling me 
over and over again she is sorry for leaving me alone that night, sorry 
sorry sorry, when she feels more guilt than you, then I do not forgive 
you. That night I had called her to try and find her, but you found me 
first. Your attorney's closing statement began, `[Her sister] said she 
was fine and who knows her better than her sister.' You tried to use my 
own sister against me? Your points of attack were so weak, so low, it 
was almost embarrassing. You do not touch her.
  ``You should have never done this to me. Secondly, you should have 
never made me fight so long to tell you, you should have never done 
this to me. But here we are. The damage is done, no one can undo it. 
And now we both have a choice. We can let this destroy us, I can remain 
angry and hurt and you can be in denial, or we can face it head on, I 
accept the pain, you accept the punishment, and we move on.
  ``Your life is not over, you have decades of years ahead to rewrite 
your story. The world is huge, it is so much bigger than Palo Alto and 
Stanford, and you will make a space for yourself in it where you can be 
useful and happy. But right now, you do not get to shrug your shoulders 
and be confused anymore. You do not get to pretend that there were no 
red flags. You have been convicted of violating me, intentionally, 
forcibly, sexually, with malicious intent, and all you can admit to is 
consuming alcohol. Do not talk about the sad way your life was upturned 
because alcohol made you do bad things. Figure out how to take 
responsibility for your own conduct.''
  Ms. LORETTA SANCHEZ of California. ``Now to address the sentencing. 
When I read the probation officer's report, I was in disbelief, 
consumed by anger which eventually quieted down to profound sadness. My 
statements have been slimmed down to distortion and taken out of 
context. I fought hard during this trial and will not have the outcome 
minimized by a probation officer who attempted to evaluate my current 
state and my wishes in a fifteen minute conversation, the majority of 
which was spent answering questions I had about the legal system. The 
context is also important. Brock had yet to issue a statement, and I 
had not read his remarks.
  ``My life has been on hold for over a year, a year of anger, anguish 
and uncertainty, until a jury of my peers rendered a judgment that 
validated the injustices I had endured. Had Brock admitted guilt and 
remorse and offered to settle early on, I would have considered a 
lighter sentence, respecting his honesty, grateful to be able to move 
our lives forward. Instead he took the risk of going to trial, added 
insult to injury and forced me to relive the hurt as details about my 
personal life and sexual assault were brutally dissected before the 
public. He pushed me and my family through a year of inexplicable, 
unnecessary suffering, and should face the consequences of challenging 
his crime, of putting my pain into question, and of making us wait so 
long for justice.''
  Mrs. DAVIS of California. ``I told the probation officer I do not 
want Brock to rot away in prison. I did not say he does not deserve to 
be behind bars. The probation officer's recommendation of a year or 
less in county jail is a soft time-out, a mockery of the seriousness of 
his assaults, an insult to me and all women. It gives the message that 
a stranger can be inside you without proper consent and he will receive 
less than what has been defined as the minimum sentence. Probation 
should be denied. I also told the probation officer that what I truly 
wanted was for Brock to get it, to understand and admit to his 
wrongdoing.
  ``Unfortunately, after reading the defendant's report, I am severely 
disappointed and feel that he has failed to exhibit sincere remorse or 
responsibility for his conduct. I fully respected his right to a trial, 
but even after twelve jurors unanimously convicted him guilty of three 
felonies, all he has admitted to doing is ingesting alcohol. Someone 
who cannot take full accountability for his actions does not deserve a 
mitigating sentence. It is deeply offensive that he would try and 
dilute rape with a suggestion of `promiscuity'. By definition rape is 
not the absence of promiscuity, rape is the absence of consent, and it 
perturbs me deeply that he can't even see that distinction.''
  Mr. GOSAR. ``The probation officer factored in that the defendant is 
youthful and has no prior convictions. In my opinion, he is old enough 
to know what he did was wrong. When you are eighteen in this country 
you can go to war. When you are nineteen, you are old enough to pay the 
consequences for attempting to rape someone. He is young, but he is old 
enough to know better.
  ``As this is a first offense I can see where leniency would beckon. 
On the other hand, as a society, we cannot forgive everyone's first 
sexual assault or digital rape. It doesn't make sense. The seriousness 
of rape has to be communicated clearly, we should not create a culture 
that suggests we learn that rape is wrong through trial and error.
  ``The consequences of sexual assault needs to be severe enough that 
people feel enough fear to exercise good judgment even if they are 
drunk, severe enough to be preventative. The probation officer weighed 
the fact that he has surrendered a hard earned swimming scholarship. 
How fast Brock swims does not lessen the severity of what happened to 
me, and should not lessen the severity of his punishment. If a first 
time offender from an underprivileged background was accused of three 
felonies and displayed no accountability for his actions other than 
drinking, what would his sentence be? The fact that Brock was an 
athlete at a private university should not be seen as an entitlement to 
leniency, but as an opportunity to send a message that sexual assault 
is against the law regardless of social class.''

[[Page 8859]]


  Ms. KUSTER. ``The Probation Officer has stated that this case, when 
compared to other crimes of similar nature, may be considered less 
serious due to the defendant's level of intoxication. It felt serious. 
That's all I'm going to say.
  ``What has he done to demonstrate that he deserves a break? He has 
only apologized for drinking and has yet to define what he did to me as 
sexual assault, he has revictimized me continually, relentlessly. He 
has been found guilty of three serious felonies and it is time for him 
to accept the consequences of his actions. He will not be quietly 
excused.
  ``He is a lifetime sex registrant. That doesn't expire. Just like 
what he did to me doesn't expire, doesn't just go away after a set 
number of years. It stays with me, it's part of my identity, it has 
forever changed the way I carry myself, the way I live the rest of my 
life.
  ``To conclude, I want to say thank you. To everyone from the intern 
who made me oatmeal when I woke up at the hospital that morning, to the 
deputy who waited beside me, to the nurses who calmed me, to the 
detective who listened to me and never judged me, to my advocates who 
stood unwaveringly beside me, to my therapist who taught me to find 
courage in vulnerability, to my boss for being kind and understanding, 
to my incredible parents who teach me how to turn pain into strength, 
to my grandma who snuck chocolate into the courtroom throughout this to 
give to me, my friends who remind me how to be happy, to my boyfriend 
who is patient and loving, to my unconquerable sister who is the other 
half of my heart, to Alaleh, my idol, who fought tirelessly and never 
doubted me.''
  Mr. GOHMERT. ``Thank you to everyone involved in the trial for their 
time and attention. Thank you to girls across the nation that wrote 
cards to my DA to give to me, so many strangers who cared for me.
  ``Most importantly, thank you to the two men who saved me, who I have 
yet to meet. I sleep with two bicycles that I drew taped above my bed 
to remind myself there are heroes in this story. That we are looking 
out for one another. To have known all of these people, to have felt 
their protection and love, is something I will never forget.''

                              {time}  2045

  Mr. SPEIER. ``And finally, to girls everywhere, I am with you. On 
nights when you feel alone, I am with you. When people doubt you or 
dismiss you, I am with you. I fought everyday for you. So never stop 
fighting, I believe you. As the author Anne Lamott once wrote, 
``Lighthouses don't go running all over an island looking for boats to 
save; they just stand there shining.'' Although I can't save every 
boat, I hope that by speaking today, you absorbed a small amount of 
light, a small knowing that you can't be silenced, a small satisfaction 
that justice was served, a small assurance that we are getting 
somewhere, and a big, big knowing that you are important, 
unquestionably, you are untouchable, you are beautiful, you are to be 
valued, respected, undeniably, every minute of every day, you are 
powerful and nobody can take that away from you. To girls everywhere, I 
am with you. Thank you.''
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________