I Have the Right To

by Chessy Prout

  DAY 3

  I woke up the next morning to a text from Tabitha, my freshman-year roommate at St. Paul’s.

  Tabitha: Hey Chessy! I know we haven’t talked in a while, but I wanted to let you know that I think about you all the time, and I’m really proud of you. What you are doing is incredibly brave, and I can’t imagine how hard it must be. I also wanted to thank you because in speaking out, you’re giving a voice to people like me who felt like they had to remain silent when these things happened to them. I know this probably doesn’t mean or help much, but you have my support, and I’m sending virtual hugs your way.

  I was grateful for Tabitha’s message, but I didn’t have time to write back immediately. I needed to get ready for battle. I threw fear in the corner and shoved vulnerability under the bed. Anger was coming with me to the courtroom today.

  I knew I had nothing to hide. And I felt confident and empowered enough to ask Carney to rephrase loaded, winding questions and to take my time answering them.

  At 9:15 a.m. Carney walked over to the witness stand again so that I could follow along with a police report he was holding. He inched so close that I could see beads of sweat on his bald head. I called him out when he missed several words in the transcript, and I looked up to Catherine for support. Carney needed to physically back up.

  He resisted giving me a copy at first and whined to Judge Smukler, “Your Honor, what I’m trying to do is hold it right in front of her and use my finger so she knows exactly where I’m reading.”

  Catherine found an extra copy in her file and handed it to me.

  Catherine: 2. Carney: 0.

  While reading another passage from my interview with Detective Curtin, Carney asked if he could skip the “ums” and “ahs.” He was asking for permission to misquote me and change the meaning of my words. His efforts to manipulate me were so obvious that I almost laughed.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I would prefer if you read it word for word so they can get an accurate telling.”

  “Does that change the meaning of the sentence?” Carney asked.

  “It does.”

  “How?”

  “Because this is just a transcript and this doesn’t tell the whole story,” I said.

  “Does the word ‘um’ change the meaning of the sentence?”

  “I was unsure of myself,” I said. “It’s the whole sentence, it’s the whole truth. I just want the whole truth to be read.”

  I wasn’t going to let some expensive defense attorney steamroll me into changing my testimony. Then Carney pounced on my use of the word “cloudy.”

  “Now, you used that word yesterday throughout your explanations to the prosecutor about why you said or did or did not do or did not say things, it was because you were cloudy or confused. Were you already being cloudy and confused the day before you got together with Owen?”

  “No.”

  “Well, why were you cloudy?” Carney asked.

  I cocked my head sideways in disbelief. Was he stupid? What the hell was this guy’s problem?

  “I was raped!” I gasped, sobbing. “I was violated in so many ways. Of course I was traumatized.”

  Carney tensed up and asked if we should take a recess. No. I didn’t need a break. I just needed this nightmare to end. Today would be my last day of testifying. It had to be.

  Somehow I found an inexplicable strength within me to go on. I grasped on to the support around me as if it was a knife and cut away my fear, helplessness, and exhaustion. I emerged with a new armor, a steely resolve. I would not let him break me. I would not crumble.

  I maintained eye contact with Carney as he tried to shut me down and make me agree to things that were untrue.

  He hammered me on the seemingly cordial emails I sent to Owen after the assault, reading them in a singsongy voice and turning my assault into a fucking musical.

  He quizzed me on my grooming habits, as if shaving my private parts was an invitation to have sex with me against my will. I wished I could grab his white beard and rip it off his face. It was preposterous to ask me, a teenage girl, about how I took care of my body and imply that it had provoked a sexual assault. I said no multiple times! This wasn’t complicated.

  I was so naive to think that all the evidence would be presented fairly and objectively to the jury. Important details—including that there were other girls who reported that Owen violated them and that I told my friends I said no—would never see the light of day because of stupid legal rules intended to protect the defendant. No, this was a chance for Carney to twist and spin, shame and blame. Distract the jury with my shaving habits instead of my words. I said no.

  I watched Carney’s eyes dart back and forth as he grew uncomfortable with my relentless glare. He ramped up his aggression, jabbing his finger at me, almost touching my shoulder. Carney repeatedly accused me of lying and asked absurd questions like whether I twirled my hair or tapped my fingers when I lied. I wanted to stand up and object for relevance. How could this man get away with such revolting behavior? He was the type of person who makes it so hard for victims to come forward.

  Finally, by eleven a.m., Carney finished his interrogation. I left the courtroom and bolted down the stairs to find Lucy and Mom. Steve Kelly followed and told me I did great, but fury pricked my skin. I wished I could punch Carney.

  Steve, as any civil attorney would do, advised against that and instead suggested that I write down some questions for Carney in my journal. Steve promised he would ask them of Carney when the trial was over, as long as the questions wouldn’t get him disbarred.

  August 2O, 2O15: Questions for Mr. Carney/ From C.

  Q. What are you wearing? Do you think the defendant could have misread intentions by your clothing?

  Q. Mr. Carney, are YOUR balls shaved right now?

  I showed Steve and he smiled.

  When we got home that afternoon, I holed up in my room and tore through more episodes of Grey’s Anatomy. I’d finished season four since the trial started. But I hadn’t done a lick of homework.

  I bounded down the stairs before I smelled dinner.

  “Mom, I’m hungry,” I announced for the first time in a week.

  “Yes, honey, let’s make whatever you want!”

  Mom was so ecstatic that you would have thought I told her we won the lottery.

  “Mrs. Hebra left us bags of groceries. Let’s see what we can find,” Mom said.

  I dug through the pantry and hunted for my comfort food: pasta. It wasn’t gluten free but I couldn’t have cared less. I slurped down the noodles without taking a breath.

  I returned to my show after dinner, leaving the room only for bathroom breaks. During one trip to the toilet, I heard my own voice blasting from the television downstairs where the rest of my family was gathered. It was the moment when I lost my composure with Carney and wailed, “I was raped! I was violated in so many ways. Of course I was traumatized.”

  My voice was slightly distorted a few pitches lower in an attempt to protect my identity. I started laugh-crying in disbelief and heard Dad yell at Uncle John to lower the volume. I felt helpless. My words were being paraded on CNN, NBC, ABC, MSNBC, BuzzFeed, the Today show, and local stations. I had no idea the trial would get this much attention. But I did it. I told the truth. I sat in that courtroom for hours over three days.

  I was done, finished being grilled like I was the offender. I was a survivor. My heart was held in God’s hands. He had given me strength in so many ways. No matter how weary I was, I would never lose the will to tell the TRUTH. I wouldn’t take responsibility for Owen’s actions anymore. I had cleared my conscience, emptied my heart and soul and brain for that jury. I hoped they believed me and trusted my truth. I knew I’d only gotten over one hump of this mighty tour, but in my heart, I’d already won.

  The rest was out of my control. We had a break for the weekend and then court resumed on Monday.

  As I conquered season five of Grey’s Anatomy, I wrote back to Tabitha. We�
�d never talked in detail about the night of my assault, so her message of support was especially meaningful.

  Me: Thank you so much for that Tabitha. I was afraid of disappointing you that night, and now i’ve been using that shame to blame myself ever since. You did not have a chance at justice, and I do, which I think is so unfair, but I will push myself forwards for the community of young women and men who couldn’t and continue to not be able to seek justice, yet. Tabitha, your support and thank you mean the WORLD to me. Thank you so much for continuing to believe in me, through all the cloudy bullshit, I hold that really close to my heart.

  FIFTEEN

  The Slayers

  DAY 4

  The seating arrangements in the courtroom were absurd. The media circus had commandeered the section near the door usually reserved for the defendant’s family. That meant we had to climb over Owen’s relatives in order to sit on the cramped benches behind the prosecutor’s table on the farthest side of the room. I didn’t know whose knobby knees I knocked and toes I stepped on, but I apologized instinctively.

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I muttered.

  “Don’t apologize to them,” Dad snarled. “You have nothing to be sorry about. You owe them nothing.”

  I was glad my time on the witness stand had ended, but things seemed just as hostile back here. Owen’s father cursed at my uncle Pete. One guy planted his middle finger on the cheek facing Dad. Another idiot refused to get up and allow my eighty-six-year-old grandma to pass by. Michele Finizio, the mother of a former St. Paul’s student and a criminal defense attorney who let Owen move in with her after his arrest, called Mom a fucking bitch.

  I took deep breaths as we waited for Owen’s friends to testify. I wasn’t required to be in the courtroom, but this was my life under the microscope. I had to be there to remind people of my humanity, and I wanted to hear what these boys had to say, and make them say it to my face.

  Earlier that morning Dad and I had observed the guys huddled in a room together with the St. Paul’s witness coordinator. I shook my head in disbelief as betrayal seared my skin. They wore matching prep-school uniforms with navy blazers and button-down shirts. Even Owen had on the same colors. Had they all planned this? And if so, what else had they coordinated?

  Back in the courtroom Owen MacIntyre was up first. It had been nearly a year since we had walked around campus together so he could give his forced apology, the one that mutated into regret for violating bro code. I couldn’t believe I had considered this kid a friend. He refused to meet my glare.

  On the stand he opened a window into the twisted sexual culture at St. Paul’s, defining hook-up terms like “slay” as “more aggressive” than “score.” O. Mac said there was a competition between Owen Labrie and his roommate, Andrew Thomson, to see who could Senior Salute the most girls. After pressuring me into accepting the invite, O. Mac got a message of appreciation.

  O. Mac: Oh and btw Chessy says yes. You are welcome

  Owen: you’re a fucking dawg

   i will owe you ten thousand bjs

   /get you fucked up the night of grad

  I guess those were the benefits of honoring bro code.

  Malcolm Salovaara was up next. This was only the second time I’d ever seen him in person, and he looked as sleazy as I had remembered, wearing an open-neck white shirt as if he was going clubbing. Malcolm was entering his junior year at Dartmouth College and he seemed antsy. His personal lawyer took up a chunk of the morning with concerns that Malcolm’s testimony might be self-incriminating and violate his Fifth Amendment rights. Apparently, Malcolm might have been in possession of stolen keys from St. Paul’s, like Owen, and the messages the two exchanged about me could be damaging. I didn’t know what they said, but I was about to find out.

  I took no joy in hearing Malcolm publicly acknowledge his slimy behavior: he and Owen had created a Facebook group known as Slayers Anonymous to send messages to each other, and they used to rub the name of an alumnus, Robert Barrie Slaymaker, etched on the wooden paneling lining the walls of the Upper leading into the dining room. I remembered guys rubbing the name on their way to dinner, but never knew the deep significance to the gesture.

  “We thought it was funny that his name had the word ‘slay’ in it,” Malcolm explained.

  Catherine didn’t find it amusing and peppered Malcolm with questions about the Facebook messages. She projected them onto a large white screen so that the jury could see them. Then she made Malcolm read them out loud.

  “So after you ask, ‘who do you want to pork more than anyone bro,’ what does the defendant respond to you?” Catherine asked.

  “ ‘Chessy Prout,’ ” Malcolm said reluctantly.

  I shuddered.

  “And then what do you answer?”

  “ ‘Hahaha are you kidding me bro?’ ” Malcolm read.

  Rage coursed through my veins and lifted me outside my body. I was frozen again.

  “And what does he respond to you?”

  “ ‘Total babe,’ ” Malcolm said.

  “And your next message?” Catherine asked.

  “ ‘Isn’t she a tessa?’ ”

  I knew what that meant. Tessa was the name of a senior boy’s younger sister. I frantically scribbled in my notebook and showed Dad.

  “And what do you mean by that?”

  Malcolm couldn’t wipe the smirk off his face. “Isn’t she someone who is really young?”

  “And your next inquiry, what do you ask him next?” Catherine pressed.

  “ ‘Does she even have nips yet?’ ” Malcolm said.

  “And what did you mean by that?”

  “I don’t recall what I meant by that,” Malcolm said, his thin lips disappearing into his long chin.

  Those grimy pieces of shit.

  “What does that mean to you today?” Catherine asked.

  “Is she mature physically,” Malcolm said.

  “Were you aware of Chessy Prout’s age?”

  “Yes,” Malcolm said.

  I gnashed my teeth.

  “And is that why you were asking about her maturity?”

  “Yes,” Malcolm said.

  “I’d ask you to testify to the date of these exchanges.”

  “January 29, 2014.”

  I gasped audibly. That was a whole five months before I was assaulted. I felt like I was going to throw up. They had been targeting me for months. And they’d been making crude comments all that time about my body, and my age.

  Catherine had Malcolm read another message he sent Owen a few weeks later. “ ‘Have you slain Chessy already?’ ”

  I wanted to bust out of my seat and clobber him. Both Malcolm and Owen. They needed to feel the pain they had inflicted on me. They talked about me like I was a wild animal to be hunted violently, or “slain” as they so crassly put it.

  And minutes before Owen took me to the top of the mechanical room on May 30, 2014, he had messaged Malcolm in all capital letters.

  Owen: I’M SLAYIN CHESSY

  Dad put his arm around me as I started weeping. It made so much sense now, the smirks Malcolm gave me during graduation weekend. But why the hell did it have to be me?

  I looked in horror to my right at Laura Dunn, the survivor and lawyer I had met in the spring. Every victim who fights in criminal court needs a Laura Dunn by their side. She had rushed up to deal with the media onslaught after my identity was broadcast on the live video feed during the first day of the trial and then several news outlets used my name.

  To prevent me from doing anything rash, Laura told me to funnel my feelings into the notebook while the boys were testifying. So I let loose on Malcolm.

  He is a COWARD . . . I don’t know how he lives with himself every day. He is a weak excuse for a human being. Both of them are.

  Malcolm was such a fucking hypocrite. I later found out that he was quoted in the Dartmouth student newspaper after attending a protest in February 2014 against sexual violence. “Sexual as
sault was a problem at his high school,” the story said, and Salovaara “takes the issue very seriously.”

  So seriously that he encouraged Owen at the same time to “slay” me, a fifteen-year-old minor?

  Catherine switched her focus to Malcolm’s interview with the Concord Police Department.

  “And isn’t it true that you said Labrie told you that he had sex with Chessy Prout?”

  “That’s not true,” Malcolm said.

  “So what’s in the police report is not accurate?” Catherine said incredulously.

  “That’s correct.”

  I knifed the notebook on my lap with a pen, cutting through several inches:

  I hope Malcolm gets arrested for lying ON THE FUCKING STAND SO MANY FUCKING TIMES!

  Carney didn’t even bother asking questions. He must have known that the slimeball now had zero credibility.

  Andrew Thomson made his way to the stand next as Joe, the other county attorney, prepared for his questioning. Anger gnarled my face as I thought of the single red rose Andrew had bought me for Valentine’s Day and the secret snuggle email he sent, too. Was this all part of one big conspiracy against me? What more had they done that I had no idea about?

  Andrew started off by claiming that the Senior Salute could mean taking a walk around campus. What a freaking joke. When he was done with that set of lies, he denied ever being in a competition with Owen to score the most girls. Andrew’s mother, Lucy Hodder, was on the board of trustees at St. Paul’s, so he had a lot at stake. I could only imagine what his mommy’s advice was. Sadness wedged in my throat as I thought about Andrew’s younger sister, who had been one of my best friends freshman year. I now realized that meant nothing to these people when their reputations and social standing were on the line. They’d rather protect a criminal than help someone in need, just to save their own skin.

  Andrew said he had talked with Owen before we met up at the Lindsay building and warned him that it “probably wasn’t a great idea” because I was a lot younger than them. That disclosure tortured Lucy and my cousin Tony, both of whom used to count Andrew as their friend. After Owen returned later that night, Andrew said he’d pried for details.