A
viral photo of two people appearing to engage in a public séx act near
the Ohio University campus in Athens was actually rapé, according to the
woman photographed.
A
university student photographed while appearing to be engaging in a
public séx act near Ohio University’s Athens campus tells police she was
being rapéd as fellow students watched and uploaded pictures.
As
many as 10 people watched and tweeted pictures and even a video of the
act while describing both their shock and humor of the scene unfolding,
according to students who broadcast the scene on Twitter.
The
couple, described as being in their early 20s, is seen in several shots
leaning against a Chase Bank window on Court Street – just a block from
the Athens police station – as the man goes down on her.
People
on Twitter laughed and joked about the photos they saw — but the woman
involved says it wasn’t consénsual, it was séxual assault.
Links
to the pictures, since deleted, were immediately trumpeted on the Web,
including by a university nightlife blog, Athens Tonight, and a woman
who sent it to former Revenge Porn manager, Hunter Moore, while boasting
of having witnessed the scene first hand.
The woman involved woke to the pictures the next day and reported the incident to police Sunday night, according to 10TV.
Athens
Police Chief Tom Pyle now tells the station that the behavior by the
people who saw it and did nothing to help is just as shocking, if not
more.
Athens
Police Chief Tom Pyle says it is shocking that bystanders did nothing
but take photos for social media — but perhaps they didn’t know what
they were seeing.
“The
community at large views this as they watched and witnessed a sexual
assault occurring, and did nothing but watch,” said Pyle. “But the
flipside of that is that they may not have realized what they were
witnessing.”
After finishing the act a source told Total Frat Move that the couple posed for pictures with each other and bystanders.
Whether alcohol played a factor in the case is still under investigation.
In the photos, the couple is leaning against a Chase Bank window on Court Street not far from the Athens, Ohio, police station.
If
one of the participants was “mentally or physically incapacitated,
whether due to alcohol, drugs or some other condition,” it can be
considered as cause for expulsion according to university policy.
Like police, Ohio student Allie Erwin says it’s not the punishment that’s surprising to her, it’s her fellow students.
“Our
first instinct as a community was not to intervene and help this woman
but to post it on social media, and make a mockery of probably the most
traumatic experience of her life,” she told 10TV.
“All
that needed to happen was to say, ‘Hey are you alright? Is this what
you want to be happening?’” she said. “She obviously wasn’t OK with what
happened. It was rapé. She reported it to the police as rapé.”
Police
say an investigation into the photos is still on going and they are
speaking with both students involved to fully understand what happened.
Read more: Daily News
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