Brock Turner Spent More Time in Jail Than Most People Who Commit Sexual Assault
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Brock Turner is scheduled to leave Santa Clara County Jail on Friday after serving only three months for sexual assault, according to the New York Daily News. The 21-year-old was initially sentenced to six months of incarceration, but only ended up serving three due to a provision of the California penal code that rewards inmates for good behavior.
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Judge Aaron Persky's seemingly lenient sentence for Turner sparked national outrage earlier this year and recently led to the judge's voluntary decision to only hear civil, not criminal, cases starting in September, according to CNN.
Twitter users are angry that Turner is getting out of prison after the brief sentence.
Although Turner's sentence was controversial, the reality is that he has spent more time in prison than the majority of people who commit sexual assault.
Turner was convicted of sexual assault, not rape, because when he assaulted an unconscious young woman behind a dumpster on Stanford's campus he didn't penetrate her with his penis, a required action to fulfill California law's definition of rape, according to TIME.
Nevertheless, his sentencing affirms statistics from the Rape Abuse and Incest National Network, which show how few rapes and sexual assaults result in a perpetrator being sentenced to time in jail or prison.
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Out of 1000 rapes, only 334 are reported to the police, only 13 see a prosecutor's desk, and only six of those rapists will spend time in prison.
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In June, Jezebel's Stassa Edwards wrote about the tragedy endured by the many rape survivors who will never see justice.
"Turner’s sentence is maddening, and what’s worse is the reality that Turner wasn’t coddled at all. Persky wasn’t lenient. Turner will be punished more than the vast majority of rapists. And there is no victory to be claimed in this. The categories of winning and losing don’t apply here; the game is fixed. There are thousands of Aaron Perskys and there are thousands of Brock Turners and thousands of probation officers who see no damage done. There are thousands of men looking only for the categorical preservation of the good reputations of the right kind of men, who neither see nor hear a victim asking for something as simple as justice."
