Lawyers for the two boys, who could be sent to juvenile jail until they are 21 if they are found guilty, have denied the charges and said that any sex was consensual. The girl testified Saturday that after leaving a party around midnight on Aug. 11 with the two football players, she woke up the next morning in the basement living room of another house. “I was embarrassed and scared, and I did not know what to think because I could not remember anything,” she testified. The girl said that the boys put her clothes on a table, but she could not find her phone, her underwear, her earrings or her shoes. Earlier Saturday, defense attorneys went after the accuser's character, calling two former friends of hers to the stand. When it was her turn on the witness stand, the girl, guided by the prosecutor Marianne Hemmeter, testified for two hours about how she discovered how she was treated that night, and how she came to figure out that Mr. Mays was only pretending to care about her in an effort to try to save himself. Testimony Friday from three teenage boys granted immunity from prosecution incriminated the defendants.
– A judge has found two boys guilty in the rape of a 16-year-old girl that rocked the small Ohio town of Steubenville, reports the AP. Judge Thomas Lipps ruled that Steubenville High School football players Trent Mays, 17, and Ma'Lik Richmond, 16, are guilty of digitally penetrating the girl after a booze-fueled party in August. A state prosecutor asked for a harsh sentence for the boys, citing an "absolute lack of remorse" the pair had demonstrated. Loud sobs were heard in the courtroom after the verdict was read. Both boys apologized; Richmond broke down sobbing as he stood to approach the victim. Mays will be jailed for at least two years; Richmond will be jailed for one year. Depending on their behavior, they could remain there until they are 21. The verdict comes a day after the girl herself took the stand, reports the New York Times, testifying that she didn't remember what happened in the six hours before she awoke naked in a basement with Mays, Richmond, and another boy around her. “I was embarrassed and scared, and I did not know what to think because I could not remember anything,” she said, adding that the boys put her clothes on a table when she asked for them. In the following days, she says, she figured out what had happened and said that Mays started to get scared, texting her constantly. “He was just, like, freaking out,” she said. “He kept asking, ‘Are you going to tell the police?’ He was trying to get me not to tell anyone.” Another boy testified Friday that he filmed part of the assault on his cell phone, only to delete it the next day.