Two students and high school football players, Ma'lik Richmond and Trent Mays, both 16 at the time of the crime, were convicted in juvenile court for the rape of a minor.
In the early morning hours of August 12, 2012, two high school football players, Trent Mays and Ma'lik Richmond, used their fingers to rape a 16-year-old girl from Weirton, West Virginia.
[2] In the days following the rape, according to The New York Times, Mays "seemed to try to orchestrate a cover-up, telling a friend, 'Just say she came to your house and passed out'" and pleading with the victim not to press charges.
She said she woke up the next morning naked in a basement living room with Mays, Richmond and another teenage boy, missing her underwear, flip-flops, phone and earrings.
[2] The evidence presented in court mainly consisted of hundreds of text messages and cellphone pictures that had been taken by more than a dozen people at the parties and afterwards traded with other students and posted to social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube, and which were described by the judge as "profane and ugly".
[2] In a photograph posted on Instagram by Steubenville High football player Cody Saltsman, the victim was shown looking unresponsive, being carried by two teenage boys by her wrists and ankles.
[4] Nodianos, a scholarship student at Ohio State at the time news of the rape broke, received numerous threats for his comments, as did his family in Steubenville, and subsequently dropped out of school.
[6] On March 17, 2013, Trent Mays and Ma'lik Richmond were convicted of rape after the trial judge found they had used their fingers to digitally penetrate the victim's vagina and that it was impossible for the incapacitated girl to have given consent.
[2] The case garnered nationwide attention after it was prominently covered in The New York Times, in part for the role of social media in its development.
[9][10][11] In early broadcasts on March 17, 2013, CNN, Fox News and MSNBC aired unedited footage that revealed the first name of the rape victim during one of the students' post-conviction statements after the guilty disposition was announced.
In the statement, Johnson said, "As the father of two daughters and grandfather of four granddaughters, had something like what is being alleged here have happened to one of my loved ones, I would be demanding justice to the fullest extent of the law".
KnightSec followed up their December hack on January 1, 2013, posting a video featuring the "self-proclaimed 'rape crew' from the night of the attack, making jokes about what had happened".
[28] Because the girl was a minor, Mays was charged with and convicted of the dissemination of child pornography, which is the reason for his additional year in juvenile detention.
Initially, it was reported that whether or not Mays and Richmond will be added to the sex offender registry would depend on a future hearing to evaluate their behavior once they had turned 21.
For example, several texts entered into evidence during the trial implied that Steubenville head coach Reno Saccoccia was trying to cover for the players, which led to nationwide outrage after he received a new contract as the district's administrative services director.
In 2015, McVey agreed to resign from his post in exchange for not facing charges, never seek employment in Steubenville education again and avoid contact with anyone involved in the investigation or case.
Bowers grew up in a small town in Ohio with values similar to those in Steubenville, where, she says, "most of the young men were never told 'No' and were culturally given the right to do whatever they wanted", something that she feels "needs to change".
[41] Brad Pitt and partners Plan B Entertainment production company bought the rights of the Rolling Stone article about Deric Lostutter's involvement in the case.