Sarah's Story
Sat. April 13th, 2013, the last day of International Anti-Street Harassment Week. I was walking a few blocks from my office to the Dollar Store to pick up some more side walk chalk to finish out the week with a little more chalking. It was around 1:00 in the afternoon. As I stepped outside into the sunny but chilly afternoon, the streets were flooded with 20 somethings and a party atmosphere. There was dance music bursting from every residence on Court Street. It took me a minute to figure out what was going on, but I quickly realized that this must be the weekend of Number fest. There were fest go-ers huddled around street corners and alley ways waiting to be shuttled to the fest spot a little ways out of town. I thought to myself, "Great. I'll be lucky if I can get to the store and back without some sort of angering experience." And sure enough, the minute I set foot onto Court Street, I hear two young men yelling at passers by from a balcony, saying things like, "Look at that ho!" and what sounded like, "Yeah! Rachet Pussy!!!" I got out my camera to take a picture. I got a couple of shots in before they noticed me and started posing. I yelled from across the street, "You're going on the wall of shame. It's not cool to yell things like pussy and ho from your balcony." They said, "If you wanna get a picture, you oughta get a good one," and turned around to moon me. I yelled, "Public indecency is against the law!" They yelled, "Oh yeah, and you're goin' to hell." I yelled, "Hell doesn't exist, but if it did, I'm sure you'd be the one goin', not me," and turned and darted into an alley. After the store, I took the long way back to the office to avoid them seeing me and changed my jacket before I went out again. A little while later, I brought my pictures into the police department to make a complaint. I gave them the photo, and they said that they knew the guys and had arrested them before. Their names are Corbin Boney and Justin Pugh. They said that they'd fill out a report for their records, but there wasn't anything else they could do since it was just one of those things that happens day after day and since the fest going on and there was all of the other related trouble they were dealing with. But I still feel like I win. The street was crowded and a lot of people heard me and the harassers hollering back and forth across the street. Hollaback Appalachian Ohio!!! I also found Corbin's profile on the OU Wrestling team's webpage. You can find it here: http://www.ohiobobcats.com/sports/m-wrestl/mtt/boney_corbin00.html. It lists his parents names and home town. I'm thinking of looking them up and writing them a letter.
Happened on April 13, 2013
Incident reported by target
Bystander Action? Yes
Harassment Types: Sexual
