A University of Virginia student who lived with Jackie, the subject of a disputed Rolling Stone article about the school’s response to sexual assault, published a defense of the alleged rape victim Sunday night in the campus newspaper.
Emily Clark, who was Jackie’s suitemate when she was allegedly gang-raped at UVA’s chapter of Phi Kappa Psi in 2012, wrote in the Cavalier Daily that she “wholeheartedly” believes Jackie experienced a traumatizing sexual assault.
“Sometime that year I remember her letting it slip to me that she had had a terrible experience at a party,” Clark wrote. “I remember her telling me that multiple men had assaulted her at this party. She didn’t say anything more. It seemed that was all she’d allow herself to say.”
Rolling Stone’s article began to unravel in recent weeks as some media outlets raised questions about Jackie’s account of her alleged rape and others, chiefly the Washington Post, found real discrepancies in the magazine piece through re-reporting. The magazine backpedaled its article on Friday amid mounting criticism.
Friends of Jackie’s are now coming forward to elaborate on those discrepancies. The Washington Post got in touch with a UVA student identified in the Rolling Stone article as “Andy,” one of the friends who met Jackie near the frat houses after her alleged assault. “Andy” — who said he never spoke with Rolling Stone — told the newspaper that Jackie said she was forced to perform oral sex on multiple men, but didn’t specify a fraternity where it happened.
Clark couldn’t offer such specific details about the alleged assault’s immediate aftermath, but she described in detail Jackie’s withdrawal into severe depression by December of 2012.
“While I cannot say what happened that night, and I cannot prove the validity of every tiny aspect of her story to you, I can tell you that this story is not a hoax, a lie or a scheme,” Clark wrote. “Something terrible happened to Jackie at the hands of several men who have yet to receive any repercussions.”
Read the full letter here.
Good for her, standing up for her friend. They need a little more of that and a little less of their “cavalier” attitude about sexual assault.
There’s something troubling about the “unraveling”: it’s not clear whether the Post and Rolling Stone are saying they believe Jackie was never raped, or whether they have found some details in her story that may not be accurate – the date, for example, or whether the perps belonged to a particular fraternity.
In my view there’s a huge difference, but that difference is being blurred – deliberately I think.
Very deliberately. And, at the risk of repeating myself, it’s the same way the rather solid evidence that Bush blew off his National Guard commitment in a way that met the definition of “desertion” got buried by one guy who created false documents.
Big news organizations hate being scooped. Look what the LA Times did to Gary Webb.
No. There are other victims in the story, the accused went to the UVA “trials” and were convicted…to a wrist slap because they apologized and were sorry. That was the biggest outrage and the victims were not allowed to talk about it afterward because of the rules. That is not in dispute and that is crazy.
Jackie may or may not be telling the whole truth, that doesn’t diminish the rest of the story. (NCSteve’s comment about Nat’l Guard seems on point).
Also it’s weird that after RS apologized the first time, they backtracked and said it wasn’t Jackie’s fault. WTF?