Prosecutors dropping 2 teens’ charges in school rape case
ROCKVILLE, Md. — Prosecutors are dropping charges against two Hispanic teens accused of raping a 14-year-old girl in a restroom at a suburban Washington high school, a case cited by the White House as an example of why the president wants to crack down on illegal immigration.
Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy said at a Friday news conference that the rape and sex offence charges were being dropped after a “painstaking investigation” of the girl’s claim that the two teens raped her in the bathroom at Rockville High School.
Defence attorneys said the sex was consensual. They pointed to text messages in which the girl agreed to a sexual encounter; an explicit video the girl sent one of the teens; and security camera footage, which they said shows the girl running to meet one of the teens and willingly entering the restroom with him.
McCarthy said the girl was interviewed multiple times and the investigation revealed a “lack of corroboration and substantial inconsistencies.”