![]() One of Marie's best friends from high school put up a website attacking Marie, warning people she was a liar. Marie got hate-filled Myspace messages, angry phone calls. Sergeant Rinta's review went on, quote, "If this hadn't been documented in their reports, I would have been skeptical that this actually happened." The victim's credibility, quote, "became the focus of the investigation, and all of the strong evidence that pointed to a serious felony crime was completely ignored." Here's Marie. His report said, quote, "The manner in which she was treated by Sergeant Mason and Detective Rittgarn can only be labeled as bullying and coercive." Detective Rittgarn declined to talk to us. Years later, there was an outside review of the case by a police investigator, a sex crime specialist named Sergeant Gregg Rinta. Detective Rittgarn wrote that he found Marie to be making, quote, "deceptive statements to include that she thought certain things had happened rather than she was positive that this happened." Rittgarn noted that she didn't, quote, "take a stand and demand that she had been raped." Detectives made it clear to Marie they needed to be convinced. In any case, both detectives wrote in their reports that Marie seemed unsure of her story. We talked to Jordan, and he says he never doubted Marie, and he never told the police he did. The shoelaces came from her sneakers out in the living room. That's when Marie realized that all of those things were hers to begin with. When police searched the apartment, they found the things Marie had said the man had used- the knife, the makeshift blindfold and gag, the shoelaces used to tie her up with. There was a rape kit and a report noting bruising on both of Marie's wrists, plus other bruising and abrasions consistent with sexual activity. Police collected the bedding, hoping for DNA- maybe fibers or hairs. Just beyond the glass door, on the back porch, it looked like someone had brushed off a dusty railing while climbing over it. The police got fingerprints off the sliding glass door. Marie was blindfolded, and her attacker wore a mask, so there wasn't a real description. The bed was unmade, green comforter on the floor, a messy sheet. It didn't look like much, an 18-year-old's tidy, bare-bones apartment- a sofa, a bike, a desktop computer on the floor in the corner. A crime scene technician snapped photos of the place. When the police arrived at Marie's apartment, they did what you'd expect- they processed the crime scene. Marshall Project investigative reporter Ken Armstrong and one of our producers, Robyn Semien, will explain how all this unfolded, starting with Ken, who'll explain a little more about Marie. The first part of the story takes place mostly in Lynnwood, Washington, near Seattle. Our reporting today is a partnership with The Marshall Project and ProPublica. And then that mistake spreads to officials and friends and acquaintances until it is impossible for them all to see the truth, even when new proof comes to light, even when it's all right there in front of them. What goes wrong in this case is something so personal, it's like people exercising empathy and getting it wrong. But in this case, the doubts began not with the police but with people much closer to Marie, people who love her and have the best intentions towards her. And the way her case went wrong- you know, we've all heard stories about police not believing women who come forward and say that they were sexually assaulted. It was proven later beyond a shadow of a doubt. It was from an 18-year-old she knew named Marie, who told her she'd been woken up in the night by a stranger who raped her.īut Shannon was wrong about Marie. A woman named Shannon was standing on her balcony in a Seattle suburb when she got the phone call. And one of the first phone calls in this chain comes right after the crime. ![]() If that's a trigger for you, consider this a warning. It happens in just three days.Īnd just to get in front of this, the crime that we're going to be talking about this hour is a sexual assault. It's like a game of telephone, where one misunderstanding begets another misunderstanding begets another, until something that is not true spreads to an entire community of people and somehow hardens into the truth. It goes terribly.Īnd the investigation that goes wrong goes wrong in a very unusual way. ![]() The other case- the same crime, lots of the same facts- is the opposite. One of them is done so inspiringly well, it's like the detectives in it are like detectives on a television show- smart and resourceful and great judgment and just police at their very best. And I want to tell you about two police investigations. From WBEZ Chicago, it's This American Life.
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