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Brock Turner, the rapist sentenced to six months in jail for sexually assaulting an unconscious woman, wrote a defense letter that basks in his own self-pity, Bustle reported Wednesday.
The letter was released by The Guardian days after Turner was sentenced, and in it he blames the incident on "excessive drinking" and "party culture."
The so-called apology in which he shirked his responsibilities was enough for the judge to warrant him a sentence that was a fraction of the maximum 14 years he risked facing for committing three felonies.
In the letter, he focused on the various social titles he lost as a result of the incident, rather than apologizing to the victim of his sexualt assault. Reiterating how the incident allegedly traumatized him, he didn’t go into detail about how he made the woman he sexually assaulted, as well as her family, feel.
At the end of the trial, the Santa Clara County Superior Court Aaron Persky decided that jail time, probation, and having to register as a sex offender is punishment enough. The short jail sentence has sparked national outrage.
Two other letters were read in court, one where Turner’s father dismissed the rape as “20 minutes of action,” which again sparked national outrage; the second was an articulate, moving account from the victim directed at Turner.
Media coverage of the incident has also been highly criticized, with people highlighting how white privilege, classism and racism factor into how Turner is portrayed in the media, as compared to to others convicted of crimes.
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