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Maryville rape case - special prosecutor named
On the heels of pressure from state politicians and a newspaper expose, a special prosecutor in Missouri has been appointed to investigate the alleged 2012 rape of a 14-year-old girl in the small town of Maryville.
Jean Peters Baker, the prosecutor in Jackson County, in the Kansas City area, has been asked by a judge to re-examine the case, which was dropped by the county prosecutor in Maryville even though the girl had identified a 17-year-old high school football player as her attacker.
At a Monday news conference, Ms Baker said her office would "thoroughly review" the case "without fear or favour."
"I can assure you politics, connections ... will not play a role in (reviewing) this case," said Ms Baker, a Democrat, who was appointed after insinuations that Nodaway County Prosecutor Robert Rice had dropped the case for political reasons. One suspect's grandfather was a prominent local politician a Republican, like Mr Rice.
The case triggered an uproar in Maryville and focused international attention on the town of 12,000. The hacking collective Anonymous has besieged Nodaway County prosecutor Rice and other local officials, tweeting Mr Rice's office phone number to a million or more followers and also targeting the suspect and his family.
Daisy Coleman, now 16, and her mother, Melinda Coleman, have said Daisy was plied with alcohol at the football player's home, sexually assaulted and left on her front porch in freezing weather wearing only a T-shirt and sweatpants. Daisy has said another boy, then 17, videotaped the assault on a cellphone and that her 13-year-old friend was raped the same night by a 15-year-old boy.
The former football star, now in college, was charged with sexually assaulting Daisy, and the other 17-year-old was charged with sexual exploitation. But Mr Rice dropped the charges, saying witnesses had refused to cooperate and that Daisy had twice cited her Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination while refusing to answer certain questions.
Melinda Coleman told the Los Angeles Times last week that she did not refuse to cooperate and that Daisy had never cited her Fifth Amendment rights and had refused to sign a document saying she had planned to invoke those rights.
Daisy's accused attacker, Matthew Barnett, then a defensive end on the high school football team, is from a politically prominent local family. Mr Barnett and Jordan Zech, then 17, were charged as adults. Both pleaded not guilty, saying Daisy had consented to sex.
The 15-year-old boy was sent to the juvenile justice system before the charges were dropped.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/world/maryvil...cutor-named-20131022-2vyc3.html#ixzz2iQFWLUfA
With the charges dropped, the boys' backers, families and friends felt vindicated but aggrieved.
And they wanted an apology.
Some launched a campaign of incessant harassment which quickly achieved its goal: The Colemans were hounded from their home.
Shortly after they left, in April 2012, their former house burnt down.
The pyre seemed to be an exclamation mark, ending a murky chapter in the town's history.
The town's attention was immediately turned towards their Republican legal prosecutor: Had Robert Rice really dropped the charges because of the political connections of one of the alleged rapists' families?
Within four hours, we had obtained a search warrant for the house and executed that, White told The Star. We had all of the suspects in custody and had audio/video confessions.
told the police that although the girl said no multiple times, he undressed her, put a condom on and had sex with her.
If they had video confessions, why were the charges dropped ?
Dosent make any sense.