The Pennsylvania attorney general's office is blaming a former state prison clerk for her own rape, in response to a federal lawsuit the woman filed.
See Original Article here - (CNN)
The 24-year-old typist was working at the state prison at Rockview in Bellefonte,
Pennsylvania, when she was attacked in 2013. She was choked unconscious
and raped for 27 minutes by inmate Omar Best, who had been convicted
three times previously of sex-related crimes, and then been transferred
from a different state prison for assaulting a female assistant there.
"Despite this knowledge, defendants ... still allowed Omar Best to have unsupervised access to the offices of female employees," according to the lawsuit, which also blames the state for the rape.
In fact, the lawsuit says
that the prison superintendent actually moved the clerk offices from a
secure floor where there was no inmate contact to a location that was on a cell block.
"There were no locked
doors between the offices and cell blocks, including Block C where (the
victim) worked, except for the copy room," the lawsuit states.
Even though Best was
convicted of the rape in May and a review of the prison found multiple
failings and led to the superintendent's removal, a senior deputy
attorney general wrote that the woman "acted in a manner which in whole
or in part contributed to the events" in his response to her lawsuit.
It's victim shaming at its worst, the woman's lawyer told CNN.
"Worse than that, it's an attempt to embarrass the victim," said Clifford Rieders, a Williamsport, Pennsylvania, attorney.
The state attorney
general's office at first declined to comment when the matter was
reported by the Centre Daily Times, in State College, Pennsylvania.
Wednesday, the office released a statement saying that it is required to present all possible defenses and "contributory negligence is one such defense."
In the statement provided to CNN, the attorney general's office said, "This initial
filing should not necessarily be interpreted as meaning this defense
will be pursued throughout the entire case," adding that elected
Attorney General Kathleen Kane was not aware her senior deputy included that defense in his filing.
"Attorney General Kane
is disappointed that she was not made aware of this matter prior to the
filing, and was saddened to learn that the filing implied that the
victim somehow contributed to this crime."
Best is serving a life
sentence for the woman's rape. The Pennsylvania state victim advocate
said it's hypocritical to use victim-blaming as a defense for the
prison.
"I think it's absolutely deplorable to blame the victim in this case," Jennifer Storm told CNN.
"It's not common legalese in rape cases," Storm said of the AG's defense. "And it shows a significant lack of sensitivity to not understand the harm this has done to the young woman and the re-victimization she's going through today.
"In a rape case, this is plain victim-blaming."
Storm and Rieter both
pointed out that the local district attorney, Stacy Parks Miller, who
prosecuted Best, whole-heartedly believed the victim. And so did a jury.
"The DA went to bat 100% for this victim," Storm said. "To then backtrack ... it's despicable, I'm disgusted.".
"It's obviously
completely inconsistent with the criminal trial," Rieter said. "I think
it's bad lawyering. It's what some lawyers do. I don't think it's right,
or just, and has no basis here ... There are some people in this day
and age who will still do that even though there is no factual or legal
basis for it."
According to the suit,
Best had been convicted three times prior of sex-related offenses. In
2010, DNA testing linked him to the 1999 abduction and rape of an
18-year-old woman in Philadelphia, and he was sentenced to 7 to 15 years
in prison for it. In 2011, he pleaded guilty to rape and robbery in
another Philadelphia case and was sentenced to 15 years in state prison.
In a 1996 case, he pleaded guilty to indecent assault, after being charged with attempted rape, the lawsuit says.
Then, while imprisoned
at another facility called Graterford, Best assaulted a female
assistant, according to the lawsuit, and was transferred to the state
prison at Rockview in Bellefonte, where this victim worked.
The victim had
complained twice to her boss -- about a week before the attack -- that
she felt uncomfortable and unsafe with Best coming into her office. She
was assured Best would no longer have access to her office, the lawsuit
states.
But on July 25, around
8:30 a.m., Best went to her office under the guise of taking out her
trash, and grabbed the woman from behind, choking her until she passed
out. She tried to blow a distress whistle she carried, but no one heard
it. Her lawsuit also claims the prison was understaffed.
A prison investigation
led to the firing of the superintendent, Marirosa Lamas, the hiring of
70 new corrections officers, and the moving of those offices where she
had worked to a more secure space, away from inmates.
In the state's response, it denied that the internal investigation was the reason for Lamas leaving.
The victim is suing the
state Department of Corrections, her former supervisor, the block
manager, and the former superintendent, Lamas. - (CNN)See Original Article here - (CNN)