Content Warning: Sexual Assault/Sexual Violence.
On the night of Jan. 17, 2015, 22-year-old Stanford student Chanel Miller fell unconscious behind a dumpster after having too much to drink at a Kappa Alpha fraternity party. The next thing she remembered was waking up in a hospital gurney covered in dried blood and bandages, only to be informed by officials that someone had sexually assaulted her while unconscious.
One year later, her assailant, former Stanford student-athlete Brock Turner, was convicted on three counts of sexual assault. Yet the judge ruled that since Turner was a swimming champion and a first-time offender, a 14-year prison sentence would be far too damaging to Turner’s life. During a statement that he made to the court, Turner’s father argued that jail time was “a steep price to pay for 20 minutes of action out of his 20 plus years of life.”
In the end, CNN reports that Turner was given a mere 6-month prison sentence, of which he only served half.
Turner’s unreasonably lenient sentence is indicative of the way in which the criminal justice system often fails to deliver proper justice to victims, especially in the case of college-aged victims and assailants. Too often, the system prioritizes the impact that harsh sentences may have on the futures of young offenders over survivors who experience irreversible emotional and physical trauma.
But the problem extends far beyond small sentences for convicted sex offenders. Most of the time, sex offenders are not even punished for their crime. While the US Department of Justice reports that 1 in 4 women will experience sexual assault during college, a Washington Post article finds that less than 1% of sexual assault offenders are ultimately given felony convictions.
In addition to cultural stigmas surrounding sexual assault, the incredibly low conviction rates for sex offenders can be credited to the way criminal trials are handled in the U.S. The standard of judging a defendant guilty “beyond a reasonable doubt” is the hallmark of the American criminal justice system. This burden was designed to ensure that criminal defendants are given the constitutional protection of due process, thereby preserving the integrity of our courts. It prevents the jury from convicting an individual if there is no reasonable doubt in their minds that the defendant is guilty.
While this burden of proof is integral to ensuring the reliability of our justice system, it is counterproductive with respect to cases of sexual assault. Oftentimes, sexual assault cases do not have eyewitnesses or physical evidence to prove a lack of consent. In cases where the victim is only able to come forward months or years after the incident, there may not be enough viable evidence to meet this burden of proof. Effectively, victims do not get the justice that they deserve. Furthermore, sexual assault survivors may not even be able to press charges due to the statute of limitations, which requires that victims come forward within a certain time period if they would like to prosecute their assailant. In many states, this period can be as low as three to five years for sexual crimes.
Given the myriad difficulties of prosecuting assailants, college students in pursuit of justice often turn to their campus to adjudicate sexual assault cases. The advantage of college adjudication is that campuses can act quickly to protect students, whereas the criminal justice system may take years to prosecute a sexual assault case. Moreover, campuses can also provide students with academic accommodations and mental health support to more effectively help them through their trauma.
But while this approach theoretically provides survivors with an alternative route to justice, many campus officials are notorious for poorly handling cases of sexual assault.
When Margaux J., a student at Indiana University, was found to have been a victim of sexual misconduct, the Center for Public Integrity reported that the disciplinary panel punished the offender by suspending him from taking summer classes. Traumatized, Margaux dropped out of the university because she did not want to face her assailant. Just like in plenty of other college sexual assault cases where assailants received temporary suspensions or essay reflections as punishments, Margaux emotionally and educationally bore the burden of her offender’s crime.
The goal of a university should be to deliver quality education to each and every one of its students. However, by not protecting victims like Margaux, universities are infringing on innocent students’ right to education. In order to give victims proper justice, colleges must stop coddling assailants and start holding them accountable for their actions.
In the long run, we should not have to depend on colleges to adjudicate the sexual assault cases that our courts were designed to handle. While US courts should not forego the rule of proof beyond a reasonable doubt, they do need to work to develop new guidelines. Statutes of limitations should be extended along with other reforms to make it easier for sexual assault victims to receive justice. In order to give survivors the justice they deserve, we must leave behind trivial punishments and fully prosecute offenders.
Varshini Srikanthan is an Opinion Intern for the 2020 Fall Quarter. She can be reached at vsrikant@uci.edu.