Victims Speak Out After Jury Convicts Former Oklahoma Officer of Rape

All 13 of the women who testified against him were African American. Holtzclaw, a former Oklahoma City police officer, was facing dozens of charges alleging he sexually assaulted several women while on duty. “We want women who are disenfranchised to know that they will be believed”.

The Oklahoma City Police Department, who fired Holtzclaw soon after the charges were made, said it in statement that it was pleased with the verdict.

Ligons said all she can say is that Holtzclaw picked the wrong lady to stop that night. “I kept begging him, ‘Sir, don’t make me do this, please don’t make me do this, sir'”.

Beyond the impending legal issues, any celebration of this verdict may overshadow the serious problems that still exist in the judicial system and the racism that infects it. Holtzclaw was convicted on 18 of 36 counts. After Sandra Bland died in police custody in Texas in July, a social-media movement sprang up to bring awareness to the experiences of Black women.

On Thursday, Holtzclaw was found guilty of five counts of rape and 13 other counts of sexual assault against eight of the 13 black women who shared their stories with the court. Jurors recommended 263 years.

“I feel like justice was served today”, she said.

“I was so afraid, I was out there so helpless”, said Janie Liggins, a woman who had previously been identified as J.L., the New York Times reported.

A person chooses to become a police officer knowing that it’s a position of honor and trust. They also condemned defense attorney Scott Adams’s cross examination of the accusers, which focused a great deal on their criminal records and drug abuse.

During his closing arguments, he called Holtzclaw an “honorable and ethical police officer” and claimed the witnesses who testified had no interest in the truth.

The yearlong probe disclosed about 1,000 policemen had lost their permits for sex crimes misconduct in a sexual or other six-year span.

The AP’s finding is undoubtedly an undercount, since not every state has a process for banning problem officers from re-entering law enforcement, and states that do vary greatly in how they report and prosecute wrongdoers. She accused Holtzclaw of sexual assault and violating her state constitutional rights, and accused the city of negligence.

Questions of race surrounded the trial.

Holtzclaw, whose father is white and mother is Japanese, is identified as “Asian or Pacific Islander” by court records. All his accusers are black. Crump praised Franklin and her group, OKC Artists for Justice, for “helping to tell America about the biggest rape case that none of them had heard about”. District Attorney David Prater said he will ask the sentences be served consecutively. “And now people finally started paying attention”, said Crump.

He will be formally sentenced next month.

The youngest victim was 17-years-old.

A “serial rapist with a badge” who faces many years in prison for raping black women on his police beat was caught because of the courage of a grandmother who refused to remain silent after he sexually assaulted her, her lawyer said Friday. And even when convictions are won in cases where rape was the most serious charge, 11 percent don’t go to prison.

The girl said she had been raped before, in incidents unrelated to the Holtzclaw case, but she’d never reported any of them.

“This is much better than county jail”, the girl said he told her.

Daniel Holtzclaw cries as the verdicts are read.

Opgrande says Holtzclaw is being held in a single cell inside the county jail and is under 24-hour surveillance by a jailer.

Information for this article was contributed by Nomaan Merchant, Matt Sedensky and Tim Talley of The Associated Press.