Crystal thought she was on the way to a hospital when paramedics whisked her bleeding body away in an ambulance.
    Instead, the blaring sirens escorted her to a Missouri jail, where police locked her in a detention cell. Time was relative; her body had already gone into shock as she suffered the after effects of a date rape for hours and what might as well have been days.  
    Police assumed Crystal was too intoxicated to realize she was being swept under the carpet. Only at the insistence of a female officer was she was taken to a hospital, where she was quickly examined to collect biological evidence and tested for STDs. Nurses lied about the amount of time needed to determine results of the STD test and also failed to provide her with contact information she could call from home to discuss the results. When she refused the dirty wad of clothes she had been wearing, nurses threw them away. One step on the trash pedal threw all remaining evidence of Crystal's rape into the trash.
    Then the final insult — a counselor gave her pamphlets about domestic violence.
    "I kept telling her it wasn't a case of domestic violence," Crystal said. "I'm not a stupid girl. I told her my boyfriend was at home with my kids."
    Crystal still hasn't received the test results, but she did get a bill for the tests in the mail.
    When she got home, depression and anxiety inevitably tightened their grip on her conscience and served as painful roadblocks that threatened her GPA in animal sciences. 
    A yoga class she enrolled in to help her relax was scheduled in the evenings, for example, when parking lots were full. The thought of walking alone in the dark was enough to keep her at home.
    Counseling she received from English and Counseling Services and a clean bill of  health from Lafene Health Center motivated her to rebuild the momentum of her life. 
    "Had I dealt with it when it happened I wouldn't be trying to make up my classes and apologizing to my teachers," she said. "I saw what happened when I didn't take care of it."
    In so many words, Crystal needs to help other women protect themselves from injustice after injury.
    The news depresses her.
    "Every time I pick up the Collegian one or two more girls have been raped," she said. "It brings back everything that happened."
    What would have caused no more than a blip on the front page of the Collegian was a life-changing event for Crystal, who represents the minority of women who report rape and the majority of women who are scorned by the justice system after it. The two demographics are not mutually exclusive.
    "The most important thing to do is to acknowledge that it happened," she said. "I don't see myself as a victim anymore."