Oakwood HS, ex-Stanford swimmer Brock Turner seeks new trial in sex assault case

Standout Oakwood High School and former Stanford University swimmer Brock Turner has appealed his sexual assault conviction.

Turner was convicted of three felony counts of sexual assault in March 2016 for the Jan. 8, 2015, assault of a 22-year-old woman behind a dumpster on Stanford’s campus in Stanford, Calif., after a fraternity party.

In an appeal filed Friday, Turner’s lawyers said the initial trial was “a detailed and lengthy set of lies,” the Associated Press reported.

They are seeking a new trial, which they hope will overturn his mandatory lifetime requirement to register as a sexual offender, the AP reported.

The case gained national attention when Santa Clara County Judge Aaron Persky sentenced Turner to six months in a Palo Alto jail. He was released in September 2016 after serving three months of his six-month sentence.

Turner’s parents moved from their Oakwood home to a house in Sugarcreek Twp. in Greene County, where Turner is serving a three-year probation. He also must register his address every 90 days with the sheriff’s office in Xenia for the rest of his life as a Tier III sex offender.

Locally, the case against Turner, a 2014 graduate of Oakwood High School, drew attention to what his classmates described as a party culture.

Turner told Persky he grew up in a small Ohio town and “never really experienced celebrating or partying that involved alcohol.”

Turner’s own supporters contradicted his statements. One teenage girl wrote a letter to the judge attesting to his good character while under the influence.

“I have been with Brock while he has been drinking a few times within the past two years,” the Oakwood student wrote. “While consuming alcohol in my presence, Brock was the same great guy he was while sober. He was always in control and continued to act rationally and be himself all night.”

A probation officer report shows Turner’s blood-alcohol content the night of the assault was 0.13 percent. The victim’s blood-alcohol concentration six hours after the assault was 0.12 percent; prosecutors said extrapolation indicated her intoxication level was 0.22 percent when she was sexually assaulted but that her BAC could have been higher.

According to records from the campus public safety department, the victim was found behind the dumpster in a fetal position, her dress pulled up to her waist and her underwear on the ground 6 inches from her body.

In California, Stanford University transformed the site of the assault. The university removed the dumpster and replaced it with landscaping and several benches. Stanford law professor Michele Dauber, a friend of the victim, told CBS affiliate KPIX-TV in the San Francisco Bay Area that she pushed the university to create the memorial.

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