Berlin’s lawyers argued that as he has recently been diagnosed with autistic spectrum disorder, he was unable to detect that the act wasn’t consensual.
“He was taught the wrong thing,” defence attorney Vikas Bajaj said. “It’s as simple as that.”
But Judge Jeffrey Fraser ruled against a lesser jail term for Berlin, noting that he had bragged about the rape, and other conquests, online.
“The defendant degraded that woman,” Fraser said. “He made her into a simple sex object… this was the ultimate violation of this woman’s body, mind and spirit.”
The victim read excerpts from the online forums describing her rape in court, saying, “It’s indescribable to explain what it’s like to read about your own rape in journal format.”
Rape by intoxication is notoriously difficult to prove, “but for them bragging and blogging about it online, we probably wouldn’t be here today,” NBC San Diego quotes Deputy District Attorney Lisa Fox as saying.
The victim and her friend were leaving a bar in San Diego’s Gaslamp Quarter when they were approached by Smith and Dick, who invited them to a nearby apartment where Berlin was waiting.
According to court documents, the victim was separated from her friend and raped by all three men while she was passed out.
This article first published on marie claire.