Remarks: Jane Doe
Sentencing: 03/10/06
Re: People v. Haidl, Nachreiner, and Spann
Your Honor, I would like to describe to you my life before and after July 5, 2002.
Before July 5, 2002, I was a normal 16-year-old teenager. I was outgoing, cheerful, loving, compassionate and trusting. I had many friends and enjoyed spending my time with them. I was very athletic and was on the volleyball, track and cross country teams at my high school. I was a straight A student. I was always grateful for my friends and family. I had an extremely close relationship with my parents. My home life was great and I felt comfortable and confident with the women I was growing into. I had goals and dreams. I was determined to get a scholarship and go to New York University. I had dreamed of going there since I was a little girl and I wasn’t going to let anything get in my way.
Very abruptly this all changed. On July 5, 2002, the woman I was blossoming into and the dreams I was determined to succeed were all taken from me. I was ripped of my adolescents, womanhood, hopes, goals, dreams and my life. All that I was and the woman I was becoming was savagely thrown away by three men; Three men that brutally assaulted me, not only with their bodies but with foreign objects also. All the while, I was unconscious and never given the chance to fight back. Cowardly, they had to make sure I was knocked out cold before they sexually assaulted me, because they knew I would have said “NO” if I was conscious.
I will re-live the morning of July 9, 2002, forever in my head. This was the morning that my father got a call from the Newport County Police Department, telling him they had a videotape of his daughter being gang raped. I remember waking up to my parents standing over me. The look of horror and disgust in their eyes. My father asked me what had happened to me on July 5. I told him I didn’t know because I couldn’t remember. That is when he grabbed me and held me in his arms as tears rolled down his cheeks. He proceeded to tell me a videotape was given to the police that unveiled myself being brutally gang raped by three men. The three men that I gave all my trust to and thought were my friends. As the words slowly rolled out of his mouth, I began to shake violently. Before I could make it to the bathroom, I collapsed onto the floor and started vomiting. I was going into shock. My parents ran to help me and calmed me down. After awhile I was able to stand up, but I couldn’t feel anything. I was numb to any thoughts and feelings. And unknown to me, I was going to stay numb for many years to come.
But at that moment, I didn’t want to believe what I had been told. This could not be possible, the detectives had to be mistaken. I was convinced that my “so-called friends” were not capable of such a crime. But as I was rushed to the hospital to be examined by forensics, I was hit with the realization that I was no longer dreaming. This was real! My entire existence had been taken from me and thrown out by the choices and hands of three men I had given my friendship and trust to.
Since that day, my life has and never will be the same. The first few months directly following the assault, I was in a severe state of depression. I would stay in bed most days and never leave my room. Sleep was difficult to get because it was always interrupted by nightmares of the events that had happened. These three men haunted my dreams and still do. I would wake up many nights in a cold sweat, crying and screaming. When I gave up on trying to get a decent sleep, I would sit facing my bedroom wall covered with pictures of my previous life. The pictures of the people I had called friends for so many years would begin to blur. The tears would stream down my cheeks, as if I would never cry again. My eyes were always puffy and my nose was always soar. I would ask God, when was this pain going to stop, or if it ever would. I sadly started to loose my faith in God, wondering why such a horrific and life damaging event could happen to anyone. I spent many months in a daze. I felt like a thousand knives were not only stabbing my heart, but they were penetrating my soul. The woman I was, had been lost forever. The people I had called friends, left me alone and abandoned. Reality hit me when I realized my life and dreams had been destroyed, and my “so-called new life and dreams” would have to be put on hold until they could be determined.
That is why we are here today Your Honor. I haven’t been able to truly live since these men sexually assaulted me. And I want be able to until I feel safe and secure that they are behind bars for numerous years. Before you make a decision on the amount of time you are going to sentence these men to, I would like to tell you about the harassment, intimidation and torture that these men have done to me these last 3 years. I guess assaulting me and video taping it wasn’t enough for them. They had to continue to make my life and my families lives a living hell since. I feel that instead of showing remorse for their crimes, they have continued to assault me everyday since July 5, 2002.
The harassment and torture started immediately after the assault became known to the public. It started with Private Investigators sitting in front of our house day in and day out, watching our every move. Our families privacy was completely eliminated. The Private Investigators got worse when they began watching my parents at their places of work. One day I was driving home and a Private Investigator began following me. I panicked and didn’t know what to do. I called my mom on her cell phone for help, but all she could do was tell me to drive to the police station and try to calm down. In the parking lot of the police station, the Private Investigator cornered me and began taking pictures of me. I was still on the phone hysterically crying for my mother’s help. I will never forget the terror and helplessness I heard in her voice. It tore me to pieces. These men had ruined me and my life, but now they were also ruining the lives of the people that I loved the most. I had to stop driving alone because I was always being followed. I had to live a life in which I had to have permission to move and my every move had to be observed for my safety. I didn’t understand! Why were they still torturing me? Wasn’t that one night enough: I guess not because the harassment and intimidation continued. The next big event was when flyers were placed in all the mailboxes and local stores of my neighborhood. They asked for anyone with information on the Newport Beach assault that occurred on or around July 5, 2002, to call a number. The fliers said my last name. My family never sent out the fliers like they portrayed. It was the families of these three men. Now my entire neighborhood knew I was Jane doe, the 16-year-old girl that was gang raped. All I wanted was to stay anonymous, but to no surprise, they didn’t allow that to happen either. It was around this time that I lost all of my friends. They all ran from me because they didn’t know how to act. I was treated by others like the one with an incurable disease, although I was the victim. I was lonely. I had no one left. I was even witnessing my family slowly collapse,