Hagersville's Zach Wobbes is going to prison for rape. But the judge in the case says his parents also bear some responsibility for the crime.
Zach Wobbes grew up in "a poison environment." The convicted sex offender is going to jail for two years less a day for gang raping an 18-year-old girl. That's his punishment.
His parents' punishment is shame and a very public tongue-lashing by a Superior Court Justice. Looking over Zach's bowed head as he wept in the prisoner's box, Justice David Marshall locked his eyes on Andy and Sheila Wobbes as they sat in the first row of the packed courtroom. He has no authority over the couple even though Sheila supplied a bunch of Zach's underage friends from Hagersville High School with booze and beer and Jell-O shots. Even though she was home while the same boys watched pornography. And even though she was in the house when Zach and two friends, 15 and 16, first kissed, groped and shaved the drunk girl and then violated her with bottles while she was unconscious. Five or six other boys watched.
Even though one partygoer, disgusted by the rape, told her she should check on what was happening in her son's room. She didn't. No, Sheila was never charged.
But Marshall was not about to let her, or her husband, off that easily. Moments before handing down his much-anticipated sentence yesterday, the judge took the highly unusual step of addressing the parents.
"Your home was a poison environment that was not a proper or decent place for a teenage boy to grow up," he said.
Andy, a tall, athletic man dressed all in black, gulped loudly, clasped his hands in his lap and looked toward the ceiling. Sheila, wearing a white shirt and black pants, removed her glasses and wiped at the tears that streamed down her cheeks. They have failed as parents. more
Zach rehearsed tears for the court: cellmate
The most dramatic moment in the Zach Wobbes sexual assault court case might not be what it seemed. The moment came Tuesday, at the very end of a long day at the sex offender's sentencing hearing. Zach was given an opportunity to address the court.
He rose, asked the judge's permission to face the father of the young woman he helped to gang rape with beer bottles, then wept as he told the story of his first night at the Hamilton-Wentworth Detention Centre.
He spoke of his cellmate, a big, bald man facing murder charges. Of the inmate ordering him to perform oral sex before going to bed. Of Zach's refusal.
"I think now I know the tiniest, tiniest bit of what she felt," Zach said.
It appeared to be the first time Zach had shown any empathy. Any remorse. A significant turning point that Justice David Marshall cited yesterday as a reason for handing down a sentence of two years less a day to Zach rather than the three or four years the Crown sought.
The problem is, Zach's cellmate says it's a lie. more
HAGERSVILLE IN PAIN
Tight community overcome with sadness, disgust over party rape and the mom's role in providing alcohol. This small community was left wondering yesterday.
Wondering how the grotesque rape of a teenage girl could have happened. Wondering why the prosecution didn't charge the mother of Zach Wobbes for providing teenage boys with alcohol before the rape.
There's no answer to that question. Officials will only say that she wasn't charged. But residents still wonder.
"She should be punished for letting all this happen," said longtime resident Frank Dillon.
He remembers hearing stories right after the incident in June 2004. But people just stopped talking about it after a week or two.
One Hagersville man's voice trembled and his jaw tightened when asked about Zach Wobbes.
"I have a 15-year-old daughter," said Tom, who refused to give his last name. "It could have happened to her."
As a father, Tom would do anything to protect his teenaged daughter, which is the reason he refused to give his last name. His daughter goes to Hagersville Secondary School, where Wobbes went, and he doesn't want her to be connected to his opinion.
"It disgusts me," he said. "Two years is a slap on the wrist and he should have gotten more. He has two years to figure out what he has done. That girl has the rest of her life to suffer." more
What I find even more disgusting than Zach Wobbes is his classmates attitudes. While all of this was going on in Zach's locked and darkened bedroom, there were five or six more Hagersville students watching the rape happen. They watched it the way they viewed the porno movie they had enjoyed earlier in the evening.
Amazingly, the Hagersville High connection doesn't end there. Dozens of students quickly heard about what happened at Zach's party. By the next day, the rumours were rampant. The victim herself heard details of her rape for the first time from students. And yet, all those students who knew the story did nothing. Didn't tell their teachers. Or the police.
Here's one comment from a severely mixed up girl, "even under the influence of alchol, Zach would not take advantage of a female. I strongly believe that he was under peer pressure from hs so called 'friends'. I do not feel that jail time is appropriate for this young man, but house arrest maybe a better idea."
more quotes from the rapists schoolmates.
The Hagersville I new growing was a place full of good people with holsome values, when did it revert back to the time of the caveman full of misogynistic drunken thugs.
Later,
Kenaz
No comments:
Post a Comment