Friend of gang rape victim blasts school officials over safety

This article is about Kami Baker, a junior a Richmond Highschool in California, who describes the night of the homecoming dance where her best friend was raped and beaten. She was mindlessly dancing when she realized her friend had gone home early. Little did she know, her friend had actually been gang raped and beaten for almost two and a half hours and then left unconscious under a bench. Baker blames school officials for this tragedy. She says there were about a dozen young men outside the gym entrance with no ID's. "The officers -- not only did they not check the IDs of those students or men sitting outside of of our campus, but the security officers who are employed here did no ... checking either. The assistant principal looked outside and actually saw those men, and did nothing about it," she claims. Police have investigated the crime scene, arresting two adults and two minors who will be charged as adults. The victim, a 15-year-old girl who went to church and struggled to fit in at Richmond Highschool, was released from the hospital last Wednesday. Homecoming 2009 for Richmond Highschool students will be a night that will never be forgotten, but not for the right reasons.

I think the saddest thing about this story is that there were 10 or more people who witnessed the victim getting beaten and raped, none of which who called 911. A simple phonecall would potentionally save a lot of damage for this victim. It makes me wonder what this world is coming to if we can't look out for eachother. Another tragedy about this story is that school police officers and officials didn't question the men roaming around the outside of the building. Isn't that their job, to keep students safe? It doesn't look like they did a very good job. This should have never happened. I hope that police officers and officials everywhere will work harder to prevent these tragedies in the future. I'm glad that Kami Backer chose to speak out about this and I hope it will bring awareness everywhere. I will pray for the friends and family of this victim. I hope this never happens again.