Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • “A devastating exposé of colleges and local law enforcement.... A substantive deep dive into the morass of campus sex crimes, where the victim is too often treated like the accused.” —Entertainment Weekly
Missoula, Montana, is a typical college town, home to a highly regarded state university whose beloved football team inspires a passionately loyal fan base. Between January 2008 and May 2012, hundreds of students reported sexual assaults to the local police. Few of the cases were properly handled by either the university or local authorities. In this, Missoula is also typical.
In these pages, acclaimed journalist Jon Krakauer investigates a spate of campus rapes that occurred in Missoula over a four-year period. Taking the town as a case study for a crime that is sadly prevalent throughout the nation, Krakauer documents the experiences of five victims: their fear and self-doubt in the aftermath; the skepticism directed at them by police, prosecutors, and the public; their bravery in pushing forward and what it cost them. These stories cut through abstract ideological debate about acquaintance rape to demonstrate that it does not happen because women are sending mixed signals or seeking attention. They are victims of a terrible crime, deserving of fairness from our justice system. Rigorously researched, rendered in incisive prose, Missoula stands as an essential call to action.
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Community Reviews
It's about rape in a college town. I like Jon Krakauer for Into Thin Air and his creative storytelling focused on writing mountain climbing literature. He's not always fact based and tends to recreate stories to tell his version more forcefully. With mountain climbing there are as many versions of the story as there are climbers. In the death zone your brain stops working properly and half the witnesses die in a disaster. You are left with some questionable and misleading stories. Especially if the author left a woman for dead he would want to rewrite the story to make it seem like he did all he could for her. Just follow her down the mountain for a few hundred meters. Truth is that people leave other climbers for death all the time on Mount Everest and he won't be the first or last person to do so. People even walk past dying climbers moving up the mountain let alone down. The movie Everest depicts his story from a neutral point of view where no one is clearly to blame.
In this book Krakauer tries his hand on another area where the true story will always remain unknown. The victims say a certain event happened a certain way. The accused claims it happened in a totally different and consensual way. And here it's always women accusing and men defending themselves. Typically young attractive drunk women who went to bed with a guy and then retracted consent at some point with the guy not stopping. None of this is clearly defined. Consent is just something one gives constantly and some men here claim moaning is consent in itself not words. Hence it becomes a bit difficult to understand the law in this area.
He starts out with a story where the accused did go to prison. A childhood friend of a woman falls asleep with her on the couch. They both have partners. They have sex. The woman claims she was sleeping. The man claims they made out and then he can't remember anything else. The guy is a top college footballer and is defended by his parents, friends, and team. But he admits to it to the police. So despite the trial going his way there is no retracting an admission of guilt as he gets 10 years in prison. The author for some reason decides to go into specific details and it feels like he's taking advantage of the victims to create extra outrage. With such cases it feels extra dirty. But soon the book goes into more boring and less outrageous court room stuff with people just speaking and speaking.
There are some huge lessons to be taken from this book. These cases are all very similar and have much in common. For the defense it's clear that talking to cops and giving them details is never helpful to your case no matter your guilt. No matter what you say these details can only be used against you. And this is the main way prosecutors convict people.
For the accusers. Firstly, it's typical that they fell asleep in random households. Places where men live and control the environment. Typically these women would get drunk with their female friends who then leave them as they are too drunk and there is a risk they will puke in the car. So easier just to let them remain drunk out of their mind alone with 5 horny guys and no other women. They should preferably stick together, but seems like many of these college age women have no natural fear of young men and actually want to hang out with them as much as possible.
They are extremely drunk and tired and it's impossible to communicate plans well or clearly state their needs. So they end up misunderstanding intentions. The women will typically want something later after they fool around for some weeks. The guys see the initial consent as a go-ahead for being more aggressive in bed at any point that night. It would be totally foolish to only educate one side to solve this problem. As reeducation a group is extremely hard and may take hundreds of years if not impossible to do it fully. So hence both sides need to understand what is smart and what is dangerous. There always needs to be a sober female friend nearby. And most cases here involved men the women don't know. So they go home with a man they trust as a they are tipsy and easy going. Yet the nature of the guy may be evil. Like a case where the author goes over a man's online persona and how he may actually hate women as he openly posts about it online. This is not something the woman who invited him into her bed would have time to check out prior to that night. Unfortunately such mistakes lead to much greater judgment errors down the line. The embarrassment becomes extra large when they have more reasons to blame themselves and they typically don't want to talk to the police right away as the story they need to tell is perplexing.
Often there will be confusion about the event. The accuser will have been drunk and not recall everything in detail. When telling her mom or female friends many listeners will tell them not to go to the police as it will lead to extra drama in their lives. While others try to frantically convince them to go to the police. Boyfriends and dads may be extra willing to support and involve cops. But if the accuser didn't have any tests done on the day it's hard to prove their story. Hence a fast reaction is essential. Know what to do in a bad situation by planning it out in case things go wrong. It's ideal to tell the story to friends and family the same day and they may guide with a clearer head. Especially dads seem eager to help out. Most female friends will tell not to involve the police or not force it. But accusers in this book often later on decide to take it to trial and at that point the mental hurt will be 100 times worse if the evidence has been thrown out by the accuser herself. It becomes messy. Unless the accused makes a deal with prosecutors it's hard to get a conviction.
In another case the accuser refuses to go to the police or medical center and even throws out most evidence of the event. Throwing out the bedsheets and cleaning everything right away. The common thing is that there is an extreme high expectation of what the police can do AFTER they accuser throws out all evidence and waits days to even start talking about the case with friends. In such scenarios the police has a giant mountain to climb. They are dealing with an accuser who herself admits she threw out evidence which will look terrible in any court room in any type of crime case. As someone who follows true crime these type of cases frustrate me to an extreme degree as the goal is to put away criminals and they keep escaping justice because not everyone understands how legal cases work and what type of evidence is needed to convict. Maybe Krakauer is picking single cases he knows will outrage readers the most. Once you mess with a crime scene the jury will not trust anything you say. And the second part of the book is all about trials where we see how this goes wrong. It becomes pure she said he said with debates about what consent is and it goes nowhere as there is no concrete evidence left.
At first I didn't want to read the book. The people who I personally saw recommending it online are extremely biased and lack understanding of human nature. So I didn't trust their recommendations. Secondly I just felt like I would not have a chance to understand this stuff unless I worked in this area full-time. But the book bias feels natural here. It sorta makes sense to take the side of the accuser. Especially when the other side just wants the story to go away. So an author experienced in selling disaster drama to readers would of course not take the side of the guys telling him nothing happened. Secondly I did understand everything very clearly. Mainly because he focuses on the court side of stuff and that's something I have read about before quite a bit. Not only that but the book started to feel shallow very fast. And I actually needed a deeper dive - the opposite of what I expected. This is mainly women he interviewed telling their stories and court room explanations. And it seldom becomes technical or focused on the law and what exactly it takes to convict a person. It becomes a book going against its own message by not really telling much so it starts to feel like it's not really a big issue in colleges.
Some may initially feel outrage, but compared to 99% of crime cases I read about this is ahead of it. Way better police work and better trial work. Just look into a random murder case and you will feel greater outrage by far as there evidence is lost all the time and cops often pick one person to investigate and don't follow up on clues pointing to someone else. With 2 people alive to tell their story you get more details. These cases overall seem way more simple than murder cases for this and other reasons. Especially as for the example the guy who admitted to it only went to prison for 10 years and then could get early parole. In murder cases the jury has to decide if someone has to go to prison for life. An enormous consequence. Plus the police always stop investigating after a conviction so the jury may prematurely stop the police from finding the real killer too. In these rape cases the women went home with the guy willingly with other people seeing them so there is no confusion about the people involved.
The book overall starts to feel rambly. I think it's a great way to introduce the topic to the masses. But issue is, I'm not the masses, I already read a lot about crimes and trials. I needed more and deeper info. And while the first half is good, on audiobook, the later part becomes a mess making one feel like the author didn't really understand the topic. Which is fair enough as he is a mountain climbing writer so he would have no chance to understand the deeper morals and conflicts in criminal cases. But it becomes too obvious. I would like to read a deeper book on this topic that is more focused. This author seems like he's afraid of his own shadow writing about this stuff.
His way of describing stats and events is always story focused. How many false accusations do we see? He always takes the side of the accuser and here he tries to defeat a strawman argument. Some cop said about 50% of such accusations are false. The author then claims "experts" disagree with this claim. But then when someone else claims false accusations basically don't happen he doesn't fight this claim at all and just lets it be even though he later goes into how false accusations are actually a real and significant thing in such crime cases. He never tries to give us the best research. It's always vague nudges to make us support victims. Which I already do so the book doesn't quite tell me enough new stuff. For anyone who thinks this is a big problem in society it will be a book that becomes boring over time as we get tired of nodding along never getting challenged on a single of our assumptions. And furthermore the 50% claim may be somewhat valid depending on how you measure the number and at what point. It depends on when you try to figure out the number. After the trial or just with initial accusations. There may be crazy women who go to the cops daily talking about alien abductions and such and their claims would then not figure into the statistics? In any case the basically 0% claim is already proven wrong so it would be nice to tackle it alongside the 50% number. The number I recall is 8%, but typically it's just "the average of any other crime, the same number". This crime area is not a huge outlier in this aspect.
At the end what hurts the book the most is that it doesn't dare to say anything new or deep. Again, quite understandable. But we mainly stick to she said he said stories and how outrageous it is that trials take this long or are this complex. University trials are even worse. I think picking more cases with clear outcomes would have been more educational. Maybe just 1 case where it was a proven false accusation. That way we could compare the true claims to this proven false claim. He does point out such cases, but without explaining them in depth us readers can't learn how to spot a lie. And we shut the book not fully getting what is asked of us or how to judge such cases. At least now I feel like I can easily debate this topic anywhere. Before I felt like I was totally clueless, but I can easily debate on this level. But there are some many biased debaters in this area that it may not be worth a serious debate right this moment. Maybe in 30 years we can try to look into it again.
In this book Krakauer tries his hand on another area where the true story will always remain unknown. The victims say a certain event happened a certain way. The accused claims it happened in a totally different and consensual way. And here it's always women accusing and men defending themselves. Typically young attractive drunk women who went to bed with a guy and then retracted consent at some point with the guy not stopping. None of this is clearly defined. Consent is just something one gives constantly and some men here claim moaning is consent in itself not words. Hence it becomes a bit difficult to understand the law in this area.
He starts out with a story where the accused did go to prison. A childhood friend of a woman falls asleep with her on the couch. They both have partners. They have sex. The woman claims she was sleeping. The man claims they made out and then he can't remember anything else. The guy is a top college footballer and is defended by his parents, friends, and team. But he admits to it to the police. So despite the trial going his way there is no retracting an admission of guilt as he gets 10 years in prison. The author for some reason decides to go into specific details and it feels like he's taking advantage of the victims to create extra outrage. With such cases it feels extra dirty. But soon the book goes into more boring and less outrageous court room stuff with people just speaking and speaking.
There are some huge lessons to be taken from this book. These cases are all very similar and have much in common. For the defense it's clear that talking to cops and giving them details is never helpful to your case no matter your guilt. No matter what you say these details can only be used against you. And this is the main way prosecutors convict people.
For the accusers. Firstly, it's typical that they fell asleep in random households. Places where men live and control the environment. Typically these women would get drunk with their female friends who then leave them as they are too drunk and there is a risk they will puke in the car. So easier just to let them remain drunk out of their mind alone with 5 horny guys and no other women. They should preferably stick together, but seems like many of these college age women have no natural fear of young men and actually want to hang out with them as much as possible.
They are extremely drunk and tired and it's impossible to communicate plans well or clearly state their needs. So they end up misunderstanding intentions. The women will typically want something later after they fool around for some weeks. The guys see the initial consent as a go-ahead for being more aggressive in bed at any point that night. It would be totally foolish to only educate one side to solve this problem. As reeducation a group is extremely hard and may take hundreds of years if not impossible to do it fully. So hence both sides need to understand what is smart and what is dangerous. There always needs to be a sober female friend nearby. And most cases here involved men the women don't know. So they go home with a man they trust as a they are tipsy and easy going. Yet the nature of the guy may be evil. Like a case where the author goes over a man's online persona and how he may actually hate women as he openly posts about it online. This is not something the woman who invited him into her bed would have time to check out prior to that night. Unfortunately such mistakes lead to much greater judgment errors down the line. The embarrassment becomes extra large when they have more reasons to blame themselves and they typically don't want to talk to the police right away as the story they need to tell is perplexing.
Often there will be confusion about the event. The accuser will have been drunk and not recall everything in detail. When telling her mom or female friends many listeners will tell them not to go to the police as it will lead to extra drama in their lives. While others try to frantically convince them to go to the police. Boyfriends and dads may be extra willing to support and involve cops. But if the accuser didn't have any tests done on the day it's hard to prove their story. Hence a fast reaction is essential. Know what to do in a bad situation by planning it out in case things go wrong. It's ideal to tell the story to friends and family the same day and they may guide with a clearer head. Especially dads seem eager to help out. Most female friends will tell not to involve the police or not force it. But accusers in this book often later on decide to take it to trial and at that point the mental hurt will be 100 times worse if the evidence has been thrown out by the accuser herself. It becomes messy. Unless the accused makes a deal with prosecutors it's hard to get a conviction.
In another case the accuser refuses to go to the police or medical center and even throws out most evidence of the event. Throwing out the bedsheets and cleaning everything right away. The common thing is that there is an extreme high expectation of what the police can do AFTER they accuser throws out all evidence and waits days to even start talking about the case with friends. In such scenarios the police has a giant mountain to climb. They are dealing with an accuser who herself admits she threw out evidence which will look terrible in any court room in any type of crime case. As someone who follows true crime these type of cases frustrate me to an extreme degree as the goal is to put away criminals and they keep escaping justice because not everyone understands how legal cases work and what type of evidence is needed to convict. Maybe Krakauer is picking single cases he knows will outrage readers the most. Once you mess with a crime scene the jury will not trust anything you say. And the second part of the book is all about trials where we see how this goes wrong. It becomes pure she said he said with debates about what consent is and it goes nowhere as there is no concrete evidence left.
At first I didn't want to read the book. The people who I personally saw recommending it online are extremely biased and lack understanding of human nature. So I didn't trust their recommendations. Secondly I just felt like I would not have a chance to understand this stuff unless I worked in this area full-time. But the book bias feels natural here. It sorta makes sense to take the side of the accuser. Especially when the other side just wants the story to go away. So an author experienced in selling disaster drama to readers would of course not take the side of the guys telling him nothing happened. Secondly I did understand everything very clearly. Mainly because he focuses on the court side of stuff and that's something I have read about before quite a bit. Not only that but the book started to feel shallow very fast. And I actually needed a deeper dive - the opposite of what I expected. This is mainly women he interviewed telling their stories and court room explanations. And it seldom becomes technical or focused on the law and what exactly it takes to convict a person. It becomes a book going against its own message by not really telling much so it starts to feel like it's not really a big issue in colleges.
Some may initially feel outrage, but compared to 99% of crime cases I read about this is ahead of it. Way better police work and better trial work. Just look into a random murder case and you will feel greater outrage by far as there evidence is lost all the time and cops often pick one person to investigate and don't follow up on clues pointing to someone else. With 2 people alive to tell their story you get more details. These cases overall seem way more simple than murder cases for this and other reasons. Especially as for the example the guy who admitted to it only went to prison for 10 years and then could get early parole. In murder cases the jury has to decide if someone has to go to prison for life. An enormous consequence. Plus the police always stop investigating after a conviction so the jury may prematurely stop the police from finding the real killer too. In these rape cases the women went home with the guy willingly with other people seeing them so there is no confusion about the people involved.
The book overall starts to feel rambly. I think it's a great way to introduce the topic to the masses. But issue is, I'm not the masses, I already read a lot about crimes and trials. I needed more and deeper info. And while the first half is good, on audiobook, the later part becomes a mess making one feel like the author didn't really understand the topic. Which is fair enough as he is a mountain climbing writer so he would have no chance to understand the deeper morals and conflicts in criminal cases. But it becomes too obvious. I would like to read a deeper book on this topic that is more focused. This author seems like he's afraid of his own shadow writing about this stuff.
His way of describing stats and events is always story focused. How many false accusations do we see? He always takes the side of the accuser and here he tries to defeat a strawman argument. Some cop said about 50% of such accusations are false. The author then claims "experts" disagree with this claim. But then when someone else claims false accusations basically don't happen he doesn't fight this claim at all and just lets it be even though he later goes into how false accusations are actually a real and significant thing in such crime cases. He never tries to give us the best research. It's always vague nudges to make us support victims. Which I already do so the book doesn't quite tell me enough new stuff. For anyone who thinks this is a big problem in society it will be a book that becomes boring over time as we get tired of nodding along never getting challenged on a single of our assumptions. And furthermore the 50% claim may be somewhat valid depending on how you measure the number and at what point. It depends on when you try to figure out the number. After the trial or just with initial accusations. There may be crazy women who go to the cops daily talking about alien abductions and such and their claims would then not figure into the statistics? In any case the basically 0% claim is already proven wrong so it would be nice to tackle it alongside the 50% number. The number I recall is 8%, but typically it's just "the average of any other crime, the same number". This crime area is not a huge outlier in this aspect.
At the end what hurts the book the most is that it doesn't dare to say anything new or deep. Again, quite understandable. But we mainly stick to she said he said stories and how outrageous it is that trials take this long or are this complex. University trials are even worse. I think picking more cases with clear outcomes would have been more educational. Maybe just 1 case where it was a proven false accusation. That way we could compare the true claims to this proven false claim. He does point out such cases, but without explaining them in depth us readers can't learn how to spot a lie. And we shut the book not fully getting what is asked of us or how to judge such cases. At least now I feel like I can easily debate this topic anywhere. Before I felt like I was totally clueless, but I can easily debate on this level. But there are some many biased debaters in this area that it may not be worth a serious debate right this moment. Maybe in 30 years we can try to look into it again.
This is the most important book I've ever read in my life thus far. Highly recommend, and yes it will make your blood boil to see the way society and our justice system treat rape victims. But read and educate yourself is a step to remove us from that stigma, plus Jon Krakauer's story telling ability is one of the best I've ever read (Into Thin Air, Into The Wild, Under the Banner of Heaven...) This should be a requirement reading for all high school students especially among young men, coaches for male sport team, parents with son... because teaching young men to NOT rape, what that heinous act really means, and the horrific impact on the victims... is far more important than teaching young girls to not walk down a dark alley or talk to strangers... which we're all taught at young girls. Simply because this book shatters all myth that rapist are a guy with ski mask hiding in the bush waiting for his prey. 85% of rape happened with acquaintances, people you know and trust, and not surprisingly most rapists don't even think they're rapist. Here's my favorite quote from the book:
“Now, should we treat women as independent agents, responsible for themselves? Of course. But being responsible has nothing to do with being raped. Women don’t get raped because they were drinking or took drugs. Women do not get raped because they weren’t careful enough. Women get raped because someone raped them.”
― Jessica Valenti,
“Now, should we treat women as independent agents, responsible for themselves? Of course. But being responsible has nothing to do with being raped. Women don’t get raped because they were drinking or took drugs. Women do not get raped because they weren’t careful enough. Women get raped because someone raped them.”
― Jessica Valenti,
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