KWCH - Kansas News and Weather - Sumner County Teen Says She's The Rape Victim
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by Jim Grawe
A Sumner County teenager wants her identity hidden, but she wants everybody to know what's happening to her. She's charged with rape and criminal sodomy after a gathering with three friends.
"It was Saturday night and we were all just sitting around watching a movie, just talking and stuff like that," she says.
Then the girl says two friends left the room, leaving her alone with the boy who she says had been her friend up until then. She says he forced himself on her. The girl says she told her school counselor about it a month later.
"I wanted help because it was my first time and I was scared," she says.
The counselor went to police and before long this girl who was 14 at the time, was being charged with raping the boy who was a few months younger and still 13 years old. Kansas law says sex with anyone under 14, even if it's consensual, is rape. Deciding to actually prosecute a child in this situation is another matter.
Deputy Sumner County Attorney Evan Watson simply says, "I am not in a position to discuss the facts or issues involved in any pending juvenile offender cases."
Attorney Sean Shores says he is so outraged that he is defending the girl free of charge.
"She went to her counselor, she asked for help, reached out for help and the message they sent her was--she should have kept her mouth shut," says Shores.
The trial is scheduled to begin in five weeks.
