Rape charges have been dropped against a 22-year-old Florida man accused of attacking a teenager last month at a Job Corps site after Baltimore County prosecutors determined there was no proof that anything illegal occurred.
A staff member at the Woodstock vocational training center originally reported he saw Marquis Bridgewater in a dorm room holding up a drunk 16-year-old girl whose pants and underwear were down, according to court documents.
But prosecutor Jason League said investigators found no semen or other potentially incriminating bodily fluid on the girl?s clothes and could not determine whether the girl consented to have sex.
“That?s really the biggest problem we have: There is nothing, no evidence that shows any sort of sexual contact whatsoever,” League said. “We can?t even prove who pulled her pants down. We can?t prove that she didn?t do it.”
Bridgewater, 22, is no longer at Job Corps in Woodstock, Director David Miller said. A group of other students were accused of drinking alcohol that night with Bridgewater and the teenager. Miller said any punishments doled out for that and “unauthorized room visits” were in accordance with Job Corps policy.
Typically, students found culpable for violating such rules are sent away from the program, he said.
According to the police statement of events, the victim and Bridgewater had been drinking Bacardi?s 151-proof rum the evening of Oct. 13 on campus when the pair were left alone in Bridgewater?s room. When the staff member pushed open the door several hours later, Bridgewater dropped the girl, court records said.
League said that even among rape cases where the victim is intoxicated, Bridgewater?s case would have been difficult to prove without evidence that anything ? even consensually ? happened.
“If we can show that there was sexual contact, then depending on the degree of intoxication we can oftentimes show that the victim was in fact so disabled that” no consent could have been given, he said.
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