Missoul Rape And The Justice System In A College Town By Jon Krakauer

Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town is a in-depth look at the issue of sexual assault on college campuses as told through the stories of students at the University of Montana in Missoula. Through the narratives, author Jon Krakauer ties in statistics and information creating an effective work that stands as emotionally compelling while remaining grounded and applying these stories to the greater problem of sexual assault. It tackles one of the biggest problems surrounding sexual assault in general, the treatment of the accused compared with the treatment of the accuser. Though Missoula focuses on the victims, it does provide much of the necessary background and possible motivations for the assaulters. These insights contribute

A town like Missoula has an economy deeply entrenched in the sports culture, a majority of its inhabitant have livelihoods that depend on the university’s successful football team. These athletes are an investment, often times given scholarships to play and make the college itself an exponential amount more than they cost. Kelsey Barrett tells her mother, “they’re football players and nobody’s going to listen to me. They’ll make my life hell” (Krakauer 49). Acknowledging that Barrett was raped by members of the football team would be detrimental, which is why in many cases, like Allison Huguet’s case, people took to the internet to defame her. Defense attorneys in cases of sexual assault often “attack the victim’s credibility - the time-honored rape defense that so often results in an acquittal” (Krakauer 136). Diminishing the victim’s credibly and highlighting the standing of the accused are both methods that defense attorneys, like Donaldson’s lawyer, use to win cases of sexual

Though not all of these athletes were football players and not all were being defended by Datsopoulos for sexual assault, the team had a history of it. In 2010, four football player allegedly raped a drunk student and in 2011, another three sexually assaulted two female students, and none of the football players were prosecuted in either case (Krakauer 8). Beau himself was a repeat offender, having assaulted Hilary McLaughlin in 2008 when she was visiting her friend in Missoula (Krakauer 167-168). People were very quick to dismiss Allison’s rape as a one time thing, a “mistake” that a kind young man made, but the discovery of Hilary changed that for many. People looked at the situation less like a one-time mistake by a beloved young man and more as the serious situation is was and the danger of letting a serial rapist