New Zealand police on Monday said they were investigating a gang of young males who boasted online about stupefying underage girls with alcohol then having group sex with them.
In a case that has raised concerns about how to police online bullying, Prime Minister John Key said the claims made by the Auckland-based group were "abhorrent" but were difficult to prosecute without hard evidence.
"It's just extremely disturbing and disgusting behavior and these young guys should grow up," Key told reporters. "It's very difficult to progress these issues if someone is unwilling to make a complaint and it's a very challenging position for a young woman to put herself in."
The group, calling themselves "Roast Busters" and mostly reportedly aged in their late teens, bragged about using social media to meet girls as young as 13 then have sex with them after plying them with drinks, TV3 reported.
It said the men named their alleged victims in videos posted on a Facebook page, which was taken down over the weekend after it was the subject of media inquiries.
One underage girl, her identity obscured, told the television station that the group preyed on her after giving her so much alcohol she kept blacking out.
"You could say I got raped. I had sex with three guys at one time," she said.
Key said his government was introducing cyber-bullying laws that will allow police to prosecute Internet users who attempt to sexually humiliate victims online.
The change was proposed after research found existing statutes offered inadequate protection from online harassment, which can quickly go viral and have a devastating impact on victims, particularly adolescents.
But rights groups said that if the claims made by the gang were true, then its members should be charged with sexual assault of minors, not just online offenses.
Greens MP and former sexual abuse counsellor Jan Logie said that if the Roast Busters amounted to a "rape club," then the justice system had to deal with it accordingly.
"If you need proof that there is something seriously wrong with how rape is talked about and prosecuted, look no further than the revelations about the Roast Busters rape club," she said.
Police said they were taking the issue seriously and had been investigating the gang for almost two years, including monitoring its Facebook page.
But they said the case had stalled because victims were too traumatised to give evidence about what they had been through.
"We're hoping that somebody will be brave enough to make a complaint to us, formalise it," detective inspector Bruce Scott told Radio New Zealand.
"Once one young lady does, well we're hopeful that others will see that she's been brave enough and come forward as well."
© (c) 2013 AFP
11 Comments
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Tandoorinacho
Shades of Waseda Uni's Super Free club
nath
Odd. from the article one girls has already spoken out (albeit a bit diffdently). Is the implication that she is fine with what happened and so no charges to be brought/
lostrune2
Technically, that's just a foursome. Now, it doesn't matter the number but whether she was forced by one.
Frungy
Yeah, this quote strikes me as odd. Text has its disadvantages though and we're missing tone, non-verbal communication, etc. Imagine this quote again with her sobbing and it has a completely different impact.
zaldaus
"But they said the case had stalled because victims were too traumatised to give evidence about what they had been through."
I think this sentence is enough of a clue as to the state of these girls. An extra word in a quite somewhere doesn't say much, this however does.
homleand
"I had sex with..." implies a consentual act. If this actually was rape, this girl should not be talking without a lawyer present. She could have blown the case already.
StormR
homeland why would she want a lawyer? she is the victim supposedly. Dunno where you are from but in NZ usually the victim doesn't need or use a lawyer, maybe you have weird justice system in your home country.
nath
Homeland:, she's 13, that's rape regardless of semantics, cut and dried, stop trying to play at lawyer.
FizzBit
Not surprising. New Zealand haHeineken of the highest incidents of sex crimes in the world. Don't believe me...check it out.
globalwatcher
TandoorinachoNov. 04, 2013 - 04:40PM JST
Your comment suggests there is something I do not know among students. Hope they are proactive in safe sex.
homleand
StormR: The prosecutor is a lawyer too. Any public statements can influence a potential jury. I'm bringing this up because I WANT these guys to go to prison.