Friday, September 5th, 2008

Rape trial jury hung

Jurors clear defendants in De Neve event on some charges, split on others

Jurors deadlocked Thursday in the trial of three men accused of raping a UCLA student in 2002 – they could not declare a verdict on some charges and acquitted the defendants on others.

Defendants Chuwan Anthony, Jamar Dawson and DeShawn Stringer were found not guilty on charges of collectively contributing to forced rape, oral sex and burglary.

On individual counts of forced rape and forced oral sex the jury did not reach a decision.

The jury split evenly 6-6 on Stringer’s charge of forced rape, and the jury cast seven votes guilty to five votes not guilty on Stringer’s count of forced oral sex.

The jury voted 11 votes not guilty to one vote guilty on Dawson and Anthony’s charges of forced rape and oral sex.

Jane Robison, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County District Attorney, said her office needs to decide whether to retry the defendants on the counts where the jury was deadlocked.

According to the prosecution, the defendants entered the student’s dorm room Dec. 5, 2002 and forced her to have sex with them.

Throughout the trial, the defense maintained the sex was consensual.

The three defendants, who attended Carson High School, had been visiting UCLA on a field trip. They separated from their larger school group and visited the dorms in De Neve Plaza.

During testimony last week Dawson said one of the reasons they went up to the dorms was to meet girls.

After entering several rooms and meeting different people the defendants went to the Fir building where they knocked on the door of “Jane Doe,” the name the court is using to protect the woman’s identity.

Stringer entered the room and had sex with the woman after Dawson and Anthony left. Earlier in the trial the woman testified she said “no” several times while Stringer forced her to have sex with him.

After Stringer left the room, Dawson and Anthony entered and had oral sex and intercourse with the woman – sometimes concurrently.

The woman testified she did not say “no” or fight back during the sexual encounter with Dawson and Anthony, something the prosecution attributed to “frozen fright.”

During closing arguments prosecuting attorney Alyson Messenger asked the jury to think about the encounter in simple terms.

Messenger said it was ridiculous to believe a woman would have unprotected sex with three men whom she knew for less than 10 minutes.

“An improbable scenario has become a ridiculous scenario,” Messenger said. “The reason why the sex in this case was unprotected was … it was against her will.”

Defense attorneys painted a different picture of the encounter, maintaining the sex had been consensual and that in some cases the woman had implied consent.

“If she did not say ‘no,’ how could he know?” asked Anthony’s attorney, Eugene Matthews, last week.

Matthews added he doesn’t believe the district attorney will retry Dawson or Anthony because the vote was so one-sided.

“The jury spoke loud and clear,” Matthews said, noting the count of 11-1.

Votes on Stringer’s charges were the closest. Stringer also was convicted on one count of sexual battery – for squeezing the buttocks of another woman he met in the dorms earlier that day. He faces six months in jail.

Attorneys will return to court June 21 to sentence Stringer and determine whether the defendants will be retried.

Matthews said he will file a motion at the hearing to dismiss the charges against his client.

“I feel as if justice has been done,” Matthews said.

“I’m very happy that Chuwan Anthony has new opportunities to go forward in life.”