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Rape of cadet goes unpunished
By Zoë Williams
williamz@mscd.edu

As a fifth grader, Jessica Brakey would write letters to the Air Force Academy to find out what she needed to do to become a cadet after college. Her dreams materialized following high school, when Brakey headed to basic training. “It was a culture shock,” she recalled. “As soon as I stepped off the bus to basic training, I was no longer Jessica. I was African-American and female, and that’s what would be seen first.”

Several years in, Brakey’s dream was shattered. At an outdoor training base, a fellow cadet raped her. “It took me a while to realize what happened to me. I had to get out of my shame goggles,” Brakey explained. From there, she began to take action to report her abuse.

According to Brakey, the academy informed her nothing could be done. “I knew my perpetrator needed to be held accountable. When nothing happened, the question became, ‘Why did this happen to me, and why isn’t it taken care of?’ It really hit home when I found that other women were going through it.”

Action became more difficult when Brakey was discharged from the academy. “The military decided I had too many questions and let me go,” she said.

Brakey’s next move started a statewide scandal about rape and the Air Force Academy as she wrote to reporters and legislators about her experiences. As the public learned of the military’s practices, Brakey sent a powerful message about sexual abuse: Survivors must break the silence that surrounds their abuse.

“I think silence is expected, and shame is a very powerful emotion,” Brakey said. “We live in an environment conducive to gender-based hatred. I think rape is not just about sex; it is about power and men taking anger out on women. It is a transfer of shame.”

During the Air Force Academy scandal, an academy judge ordered Brakey’s medical providers to turn over confidential medical records, with the threat of arrest for noncompliance.

In the media, Brakey received heat from well-publicized misogynists, such as Mike Rosen of the Rocky Mountain News, who stated, “The surest way to avoid mistreatment of women at the service academies is not to admit them in the first place.”

The man Brakey named as the perpetrator has not been punished.

In response to the “boys will be boys” mentality, Brakey said, “If I carry an Uzi with me to the town square and start killing people, is that Jess being Jess or is that a fucking crime? People would rather live in denial and vilify victims who are telling the truth.”

Despite the difficulties Brakey faced in her pursuit of justice, she said she does not regret her choice to expose the inner workings of the Air Force Academy. “I have most of the answers I was looking for. Nothing has changed at the academy. It was not fair. It was wrong. I would do it again.

“Rapists are not born; they are made. Seventy-five percent of those ingredients can be found at the Air Force Academy,” she said.

At the beginning of her struggle, Brakey hoped to bring about change. “They could restructure and they could stop this.”

If every woman, child or man that experienced sexual assault were willing to expose the horrors of the abuse and set the same demands, the paradigm of shame, ignorance and abuse can shift.

The cloud of silence surrounding gender-motivated violence and sexual assault is a primary reason such abuses are perpetuated. When survivors come forward, they are able to break out of shame and pursue an end to this violence.

Most of the reporters who covered Brakey’s story won awards for their reporting. The person truly deserving of the awards is Brakey, a woman with the courage to prevail over shame and violence to set an example for survivors fighting sexual assault.