Ohio rape trial focuses on girl’s intoxication

Ohio rape trial focuses on girl’s intoxication

STEUBENVILLE, Ohio (AP) — The trial of two Ohio high school football players accused of raping a 16-year-old girl began as a contest between prosecutors insisting the girl was too drunk to consent to sex and defense attorneys portraying her as someone who was intoxicated but still in control of her actions.

Testimony was scheduled to continue today before Judge Thomas Lipps, who is hearing the case without a jury.

Three teenage boys who are key to the prosecution’s case are still to take the stand this week. Defense attorneys could call the girl to testify since a West Virginia judge ruled Tuesday night that she and two of her friends could be subpoenaed.

The case has riveted the small city of Steubenville amid allegations that more students should have been charged and led to questions about the influence of the local football team, a source of a pride in a community that suffered massive job losses with the collapse of the steel industry.

Steubenville High School football players Trent Mays and Ma’Lik Richmond maintain their innocence.

In his opening statement, Mays’ attorney, Brian Duncan said his 17-year-old client “did not rape the young lady in question.” Richmond’s attorney gave no opening statement.

The girl was “substantially impaired” after an alcohol-fueled party, a prosecutor said Wednesday in her opening statement at the boys’ trial. She said the girl was unable to consent to sex and suffered humiliation and degradation when she was raped by the football players.

“She wasn’t participating, she wasn’t moving, she wasn’t talking,” said special prosecutor Marianne Hemmeter, referring to the second of two alleged attacks in the basement of a house.

Richmond and Mays are charged with digitally penetrating the West Virginia girl, first in the back seat of a moving car after a party Aug. 11 and then in the basement of a house. Mays also is charged with illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material.

Witnesses said the girl was so drunk she threw up at least twice and had trouble walking and speaking. She also was photographed being carried by the two boys.

If convicted, Mays and Richmond could be held in a juvenile jail until they turn 21.

The Associated Press normally does not identify minors charged in juvenile court, but Mays and Richmond have been widely identified in news coverage, and their names have been used in open court.