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发帖数: 11545 | 1 White high school football players in Idaho charged with raping black,
disabled teammate with a coat hanger
Three white high school football players at Dietrich High School in Idaho
have been charged in the October 2015 rape of their black disabled teammate.
The alleged victim's family filed a $10 million lawsuit against the school.
Here's what you need to know. (Monica Akhtar/The Washington Post)
When a teammate held out his arms after football practice in their high
school locker-room, the boy thought he was about to get a hug.
Instead, he got viciously raped, authorities say.
As the teammate restrained the boy, another football player allegedly thrust
a coat hanger into the boy’s rectum. Then a third teammate kicked the coat
hanger several times, according to a criminal complaint.
The Oct. 23, 2015 incident has rocked the tiny town of Dietrich, Idaho. This
spring, after several months of investigation, the state Attorney General’
s office filed sexual assault charges against all three alleged attackers.
Two of the teenagers are being charged as adults and could face life in
prison, under Idaho law.
Earlier this month, the case took an even darker turn when the boy’s family
filed a $10 million lawsuit against Dietrich High School.
According to the lawsuit, the alleged rape wasn’t a one-off but rather the
culmination of months of racist abuse by white students against the boy, who
is black.
The boy “was taunted and called racist names by other members of the team
which names included ‘Kool-Aid’ ‘chicken eater’ ‘watermelon’ and [the
N-word],” the suit alleges.
The civil complaint filed in the U.S. District Court in Idaho also claims
that one of the students charged with sexual assault displayed a Confederate
flag and demanded the boy recite a racist song titled “Notorious KKK.”
All three of the boy’s attackers were white, the suit says.
The suit, which names the 18-year-old boy, was provided to The Washington
Post by his attorney. However, The Post generally does not name victims of
sexual assault.
In addition to Dietrich High School, the lawsuit also names 11 employees as
defendants. It claims school administrators and coaches did nothing to stop
the racial and physical abuse towards the boy, who was especially vulnerable
due to “mental disorders including learning disabilities.”
The suit even claims that Dietrich football coaches encouraged other players
to fight the boy, allowing a much larger student to knock the boy
unconscious as other students shouted “catcalls, taunts and racial epithets
.”
Dietrich, Idaho
Against the alleged backdrop of widespread racial abuse at Dietrich, one
individual stands out: John R.K. Howard.
Howard, 18, is one of the three students accused of sexually assaulting the
boy with the coat hanger. He is charged as an adult with one count of
forcible penetration by use of force or a foreign object, according to the
criminal complaint.
The lawsuit paints Howard as the ringleader of the racist abuse against the
boy, who was adopted at age four by white parents living in the
predominantly white town of 334 people.
“Mr. Howard is a large and aggressive male who had been sent to live with
his relatives in Idaho due to his inability to keep out of trouble in Texas,
” the complaint says. “Mr. Howard is a relative of prominent individuals
in the community and, at least in part due to his athletic ability and
community connections, the Defendants ignored or were deliberately
indifferent to the behavior of Mr. Howard which included aggression,
taunting and bullying of The Plaintiff and other students in the District.
With deliberate indifference, the Defendants did nothing to curb the vicious
acts of Mr. Howard who brought with him from Texas a culture of racial
hatred towards the Plaintiff.”
The boy, one of the few black students at Dietrich let alone his football
team, was subjected to frequent abuse by Howard and his fellow teammates,
including “aggressive ‘humping’, jumping on him from the back and
simulating anal sex,” according to the suit. His fellow football players
allegedly gave him painful wedgies, stripped him of his clothes and took
naked photos of him in the locker-room. One student drew a picture of the
boy sitting in the back of the bus on a classroom chalkboard.
It was Howard, however, who was allegedly behind the worst abuse.
It was Howard who allegedly forced the boy to recite the words to “
Notorious KKK,” a bitterly racist and violent rap song set to the tune of
Notorious B.I.G.’s “Can’t You See,” the suit alleges.
It was Howard who, with his bare fists, allegedly knocked out the boy, who
was made to wear boxing gloves, as teammates and coaches formed a circle
around them.
And it was Howard who allegedly kicked the coat hanger five or six times,
causing the boy “rectal injuries” that required hospital treatment, the
lawsuit claims.
Another player, 17-year-old wide receiver Tanner Ward, has been also been
charged as an adult with forcible penetration, according to local news
website MagicValley.com. According to the lawsuit, Ward, “physically forced
a coat hanger into the Plaintiff’s rectum” before Howard kicked it.
Facebook photos show Ward participating in cowboy competitions. A quick-
footed wide receiver, he has his own web page on hudl.com devoted to
highlights of his football prowess.
A lawyer representing Ward did not return requests for comment.
A third football player, age 16, has been charged as a juvenile. His name
has not been released.
Last month, during a preliminary hearing in the case against Ward, the boy
testified how he had been tricked with kindness moments before the cruel
attack.
The boy said Howard and Ward started harassing him before practice on Oct.
22, giving him a “power wedgie” so violent it tore his boxers.
That was nothing compared to what would come after practice, however.
When the third teammate asked the boy for a hug, the boy agreed, only for
the teammate to restrain him and signal for the others to attack, the boy
said.
“I screamed,” he testified, according to MagicValley.com. “I was pretty
upset. I felt really bad. A little bit betrayed and confused at the same
time. It was terrible — a pain I’ve never felt.”
Ward’s attorney argued that the boy’s testimony conflicted with that of
another witness, but Judge Mark Ingram allowed the case to continue. Ward’s
trial is scheduled to begin on September 26. The Lincoln County Clerk’s
Office could not say Tuesday whether he had filed a plea.
Howard, who is finishing high school in Texas, has a preliminary hearing set
for June 10 and has not yet entered a plea.
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