Overview
Steubenville Rape Case refers to the ongoing trial of two Steubenville High School student athletes who have been charged with alleged rape of a 16-year-old girl from Weirton, West Virginia in August 2012. Due to its highly publicized nature, the case has become a notable topic of discussions on social networking sites and other online communities.
Background
On August 22nd, 2012, Trent Mays and Ma’lik Richmond, two football players from Steubenville High School in Ohio, were arrested[5] and charged with alleged rape and kidnapping of a 16-year-old girl from Weirton, West Virginia at a party on August 11th.The kidnapping charge was subsequently dropped[24] and the trial is scheduled for February 13th, 2013. However, as of January 6th, attorneys are attempting to postpone and relocate the trial after the backlash caused by the social media attention.[25]
When her parents went to the Steubenville police on August 14th, they came with a flash drive containing the photographs, screenshots of the tweets and a video in which a former Steubenville baseball player was shown discussing a rape.
Notable Developments
August 2012: Blog Coverage
Following the local news report of the arrests, a few bloggers began discussing the case online, including Ohio-based crime blogger Alexandria Goddard[2] who began detailing the case on her personal blog on August 24th. Goddard’s posts highlighted tweets[3] about the events and a YouTube vlog[4] tagged with “rape” and “drunk girl” that she had found on the social media accounts of the two boys. In October, she was sued for defamation[6] by the parents of one of the students named on her blog, but as of January 4th, the suit had been dropped.[23] Following the rapists’ guilty verdict, Goddard was publically praised for her work bringing attention to the case.[39]
December 16th: New York Times Coverage
On December 16th, 2012, the New York Times[1] brought the case to national attention after publishing an in-depth look at the case, specifically the manner in which the story unfolded on Twitter and Instagram as people began sharing explicit photos of the victim. The piece also detailed the response of Steubenville’s football coach Reno Saccoccia, who defended his players and stated in November that he did not “do the Internet” or see the pictures or comments being shared.
December 23rd: #OpRollRedRoll
In late December, an offshoot group of Anonymous known as KnightSec got involved with the case by hacking into the football team’s website and replacing the page with a video message warning that the group would release personal information for every student and staff member involved in the case unless an apology was issued to the victim.[7] Operation RollRedRoll was launched on December 23rd, named after the Steubenville High School football fan site RollRedRoll.com.[11] On January 1st, 2013, Local Leaks[12] put up a blog post titled “The Steubenville Files,” detailing the people involved in the case including the owner of the fan site, James Parks, whose email was full of pornographic images of young women, and Coach Saccoccia, who allegedly gave drugs and alcohol to athletes who excelled. The post also profiled six students known as “The Rape Crew,” one of which had admitted to raping a girl in a leaked video.
December 29th: Occupy Steubenville
In conjunction with Operation RollRedRoll, hundreds of people[8] gathered in front of the Jefferson County Court House in support of the victim on December 29th, 2012. Dubbed “Occupy Steubenville,” the event went onto spawn the hashtag #OccupySteubenville[9] and the official Twitter account for the movement @Oc_Steubenville[10], which launched on January 3rd, 2013. A second rally was held on January 5th[26], which had a much
[42]Gawker – This Two-Year-Old Onion Story Perfectly Predicted CNN’s Shocking Steubenville Rape Trial Coverage
[43]Thought Catalog – CNN’s Steubenville Coverage Matches 2011 ‘Onion’ Athlete-Rape Parody Video
[44]ABC News Univision – The Onion Predicted Media’s Handling of Steubenville Rape
[45]Mediaite – Did The Onion Predict CNN’s ‘Sympathetic’ Coverage Of The Steubenville Rapists?
[46]Change.org Petition – CNN: Apologize on air for sympathizing with the Steubenville rapists.