That depends on the individual person themselves. Some have no qualms watching a fellow human being going through torture and there are some that could not stomach someone being attacked. It wasn't one person watching this poor girl go through this ya know. They could have stopped this!!

Can anyone imagine something? What if this girl saw all these people watching, some taking pictures, some laughing (disgusting)? I cannot imagine what was going through her mind if she saw the people acting like that. As I said it was no one bystander, there were bystanderS!! I know in my heart I could not have stood there and watched, I would have done something, SOMETHING to help that poor girl.

yes I would have stepped it, actually most of my friends that knew me when I was younger think that is how I am going to die...trying to save someone in such a predicament.

I had a girl at my school that was sexually/physically abused by her dad as a result she was a tad 'off' socially...so then she came to school and got picked on there as well. I would stand up for her and tell the other kids to leave her alone. I just got an email from her that almost made me cry.

"mom had cancer in her overy so they had to remove it. Thus why i've been off work for 5 weeks helping mom. But anothe 9 days and i go back to work. And i would really like you to come. Meet jimmy and i wanna see you. I have a confestion to make you where my hero growing up. When everyone else was being mean you where always there you had no fear of telling everyone to back off and i trusted you. Your like my big brother and even with all the distance in the last 10 years somewhere deep down i know that you'll still always be there for me... Chickmonk cheaks...... Really hope your coming to vegas. hey maybe you can pick us up from the airport?
"-

oh my goodness...I just got home from work and read through here. Some interesting posts..what happened to my thread??
I can see we all are very passionate about this...
The original question is would you help...I'm seeing most would indeed, makes me feel better about humanity in general.

Sorry, just don't believe this story is true. Too many holes.

Sorry, just don't believe this story is true. Too many holes.

That was a joke right?

It is important that with these horrid crimes that we are constantly searching for a proactive approach for prevention at all levels.

I guess you do not remember our history here at all then.

Witch trials-women men children burned and drowned and other things
Slavery- dismemberment, deflowering of virgins, death at all ages, hangings where they burned them also, etc...
Placing people in an electric chair and frying them in the name of justice, sick
Etc...

That is only a few of ours.

Never think Americans are better than others in the world because we are not.

I am more scared of people who say "they are animals, I would never do something like that. I would intervene."

Because truthfully, if you look at these kinds of cases, the people involved are generally just "normal" people. I'm not talking about the initial rapists........I'm talking about the bystanders and others who knew what was going on and did nothing.

If you've never seen "An American Crime" it's a interesting movie. Sort of looks into this as an entire neighborhood of young people knew of, and participated in, the brutal treatment of one girl kept in some woman's basement for a couple of months. There are many, many cases throughout history where people have stood by and let atrocities happen. Don't be so sure you wouldn't do the same.

Normal scares me too.....

The news last night said the 7th arrest has been made ...

Maybe you will believe this.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/10/27/california.gang.rape.investigation/index.html?eref=rss_topstories

These monsters should pay dearly for what they have done to this girl. Personally, nothing a bullet wouldn't solve. They left her there to die the sick bastards. I have no mercy for anyone that does this. Some of the bystanders decided to participate. PIGS! Filthy rotten pigs and this poor poor girl. My heart goes out to her, not the thugs that did this. So bleeding hearts, rake me over the coals, I don't give a damn, my heart is for this girl, not these ***holes that deserve the worst punishment possible.

Checked the link, and read the story.
Now, just wondering what the hell pa was doing. Whenever I let my 16 year old daughter go to any after school functions she has rules:
1) Always stay close to other people you know and trust, never wander away alone.
We also use our cellphones so she knows when I will be there, and I am watching for her. Five minutes is all it takes for me to be doing double checks.
The school, serious lawsuits brewing I have a feeling. If it happened on school grounds they are liable.
Not even going to say what else I took from that article, but I will say it sure wasn't a very good opinion of a few "groups", ESPECIALLY the so called adults in charge.
They will probably also never find all of them, since some probably just scampered back across the border.

Grad notes: Richmond should address underlying causes of rape
By Carla Hansen
Posted in Opinions
Posted on November 11, 2009

Imagine for a moment you have a penis.

What would it be like?

My first thought is uncomfortable, but that’s because I’m pro-va jay jay. But besides having sex organs on the outside, what does a penis bring to a person? Is this question hard, no pun intended, to answer if you’re reading this sans vagina?

My answer is that a penis equals power. This equation must have missed my statistics flash cards.

Of course, there are other human characteristics which denote power as well, but those who are endowed with the penis have an advantage in the power struggle.

Why have I used the word penis five times already? Lately I’ve started to understand and recognize this power more than before.

Throughout my undergraduate career I learned how to see the world through many different lenses. The one lens I can’t seem to shake is the feminist one. Through this lens I’ve come to understand the penis equals power equation is called Patriarchy.

Before I begin regurgitating information from my introduction to women’s studies class, I want to discuss an event which occurred recently that has preoccupied my facebook statuses.

About a month ago, a 15-year-old student was gang raped by at least seven boys\men – while people watched – at Richmond High School after a school dance.

I’ve followed the news surrounding this event for three reasons: I was born and raised in Richmond, I’m a feminist and I’m a graduate student in the public policy program who can’t help but think of how to remedy the problem with a policy.

The news surrounding this event has focused on the negative opinion people across our state and nation have about the Richmond community, arresting alleged rapists and making the campus safer for students.

Of these three issues I’ve focused on the last. I could care less what people say about Richmond. Yes, it is my hometown but considering the level of horrible this event is on, a person calling my city barbaric is the least of my concerns. And I want all of these alleged criminals arrested, but punishment doesn’t equal prevention. Unless we’re cutting off their power tools, I’m not interested.

So, how is the school proposing to make its campus safer?

The brilliant idea they’ve come up with is to install lights. The place where the crime was occurred was dark. Naturally the solution is lights and lots of them. And maybe even some video cameras here and there.

Really?

I highly doubt these boys\men raped this girl only because it was dark. In that case let’s pair mace and rape whistles with street lamps to prevent rape from happening anywhere.

How about teaching “Don’t Rape Girls.” Is that so profound an idea that no one has come up with it except a grad student at a women’s college?

The underlying problem that I don’t think people are seeing, or want to see, is our culture and its objectification of women. Boys\men do it and us girls\women do it to ourselves.

My assumption is this girl became, or was always considered, an object to these boys\men when they robbed, beat and continuously raped her. She wasn’t a person.

If the problem is how our society views women, then how do we fix that?

There’s no School House Rock to teach us. Believe me, I googled it and only learned about a bill becoming a law.

I’m wondering why Richmond High School isn’t creating a program that teaches feminist rhetoric and theory. Of course they couldn’t use those exact words without being criticized for teaching bra burning and lesbianism, but wouldn’t a program teaching respect and value for women be more productive than lighting up the darkness?

Enlightening up the darkness is what needs to be done. As corny as that sounds, it’s true.

Women are half the population, half of the workforce and receive half the respect. Where’s the outrage? I think its time for the women of Mills who marinate in feminism all day to stand up and do something.

This fifteen-year old rape survivor deserves more than some bright halogen lights – even if they are the energy saving kind.

'I thought she was dead for a minute,' Richmond gang-rape witness reports

By Karl Fischer and Malaika Fraley
Contra Costa Times
Posted: 11/10/2009 05:14:02 PM PST
Updated: 11/10/2009 08:08:10 PM PST

Salvador Rodriguez said he found a naked girl in the bushes, and he offered her his shirt. He helped her to a bench, slick with spilled drink.

A former roommate — now a rape suspect — appeared out of the shadows of that Richmond High School courtyard on homecoming night and told Rodriguez he needed to leave. Roughly.
He says he thought to find a phone, but didn't want to leave behind the 16-year-old victim of the brutal campus gang rape that stunned the nation Oct. 24.

That's his story. The 21-year-old once arrested for the crime now wants his neighbors to know he's not a monster.
"Nope, I did not rape her," Rodriguez told KGO-TV during an exclusive interview Tuesday. "I did not beat
her. I did not rob her. I did not rape her. I was trying to help her. That's all I want people to know."

Rodriguez spoke in front of the campus, shortly before six other young men accused of the crime appeared across town in Contra Costa Superior Court.

Richmond police also arrested Rodriguez, four days after the assault, but prosecutors declined to charge him for lack of evidence.
"We know Salvador (Rodriguez) was there. The investigation is continuing," police Lt. Mark Gagan said. "We are still awaiting the results of forensic tests," expected later this week.
Rodriguez said his DNA will not appear. He says he saw a crowd hanging out in a courtyard on the north end of campus and stopped to say hello.

"I saw kicking. I saw people dehumanizing her," he said. "I had just come (to campus) to skate. They had their own bottle, I wasn't even drinking with them."

He said he saw about six people in the group, including 19-year-old Manuel Ortega, with whom he says he once lived and who is charged in the case.

"I reached for her and she started screaming," Rodriguez said. "I said, 'Hey, I want to help you! I don't want to hurt you!'"
She calmed after that, he said. Rodriguez said he sat beside her and clothed her in his shirt, though police later found no such shirt at the crime scene. Rodriguez ran from the police during his arrest, during which officers used force to subdue him.
"People say, 'Why didn't you call the police?'" Rodriguez said. "But at the same time, I live in Richmond."

Meanwhile, in court Tuesday, a prosecutor handed over 685 pages of documents and 28 DVDs containing evidence to defense attorneys for the six defendants in the case.
"In most average felony cases you're talking less than 100 pages," prosecutor Dara Cashman said after the defendants identified their attorneys in a Richmond courtroom.

More than 60 people, many of them teens supporting the defendants, watched the latest court appearance for Cody Ray Smith, 15, of San Pablo; Ari Morales, 16, of San Pablo; Marcelles Peter, 17, of Pinole; Jose Carlos Montano, 18, of Richmond; Manuel Ortega, 19, of Richmond; and Elvis Josue Torrentes, 21, of Richmond. Prosecutors said the brutality of the crime led them to charge the juvenile suspects as adults.

Police say they believe they've arrested all the main participants in the rape.

Defense attorneys on Tuesday received an amended complaint, which now includes charges for all six defendants. Smith withdrew his previous not guilty plea so his attorney could review the prosecution's case. Attorneys and family members for the defendants had no comment Tuesday afternoon

LOL.

Can't discuss posters, just the subject at hand...lol Good thing

Human brutality is a known fact. As with these kids we need to discover what is wrong with the kids who did it, kids who watched and environmental influences that made it a thought in the first place. Punishment of course but proactivity should also be priority.

This doesn't have any new information, but this opinion piece made first page of google news:



from http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/01/EDR11ACV5R.DTL

I'd heard the poor girl quit counting at 40 rapes. Can anyone confirm or contradict this?