A central and sad fact of sexual violence is the reluctance and even unwillingness of many victims to come forward. Whether out of misplaced shame, fear of another attack or distrust of authorities, too many victims choose to stay silent as their attackers go unpunished. So it is important to note and salute the bravery of a woman who agreed to travel half a world and relive a decade-old nightmare to bring her attacker to justice.
A central and sad fact of sexual violence is the reluctance and even unwillingness of many victims to come forward. Whether out of misplaced shame, fear of another attack or distrust of authorities, too many victims choose to stay silent as their attackers go unpunished. So it is important to note and salute the bravery of a woman who agreed to travel half a world and relive a decade-old nightmare to bring her attacker to justice.
“He said, ‘I will kill you if you scream again.’ ” That was a piece of the powerful testimony this week that helped convict Jesse Matthew. The witness, who was in the United States on a student visa, was walking to her Fairfax, Virginia, home from the grocery store when Matthew assaulted her in 2005. He grabbed her from behind, dragged her to a wooded area, sexually assaulted her and beat her before he was startled and ran off. “I was not able to understand if this was reality or some kind of bad dream,” she testified.
After her testimony, Matthew — who is charged with capital murder in the death of University of Virginia student Hannah Graham and suspected in the killing of Virginia Tech student Morgan Harrington — dropped his defense. Instead, he entered an Alford plea that conceded there was enough evidence to convict him.
The woman answered explicit questions about the assault and provided information about private aspects of her life.
Yet she was resolute, speaking in even tones, The Post’s Justin Jouvenal and T. Rees Shapiro reported, her voice quavering only when she detailed the specifics of the assault. No doubt that kind of strength helped her as she faced the hurdles of getting justice, from submitting to medical examination to repeated questioning by police and prosecutors. She now lives in India, where she returned soon after the attack, but she wasn’t subpoenaed to testify against Matthew; she came here voluntarily. She also asked to give a victim impact statement at a hearing that has been set for Thursday. One thing that has motivated her, Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney Raymond Morrogh told us, was wanting to make it less likely that other women would go through what she did.
The media generally withhold the name of people who have been sexually assaulted, but that sometimes makes it hard to thank or praise them. Or to think of them not as victims but as survivors. Even better was the description posted online from one reader about this woman: “a hero.”
— Washington Post