Family Claims Miscarriage of Justice and Vows to Fight On
By Royston Sim –
A former Davis resident was sentenced to 378 years and 4 months in state prison Friday at the Yolo County Superior Court. It is one of the longest sentences in Yolo County history.
Superior Court Judge Timothy L. Fall sentenced Ajay Kumar Dev, 42, for his multiple count conviction of the serial molest and rape of his adopted daughter, which allegedly occurred between January 1999 and December 2004.
California law mandates full and consecutive sentences for the 46 forcible sexual assaults. Fall sentenced Dev to the upper term of eight years for each of those separate counts after saying the factors in aggravation, including violation of a position of trust, outweighed the sole factor in mitigation – the defender’s lack of prior record. Fall also sentenced Dev to the legally mandated full middle term of two years each for two separate acts of witness dissuasion against the victim.
“A consecutive sentence of six years and four months was handed down for six other non-forcible counts of chid molestation for which the jury had convicted Mr. Dev,” stated District Attorney Jeff Reisig in a news release. “Judge Fall also sentenced the defendant to the upper term of three years on twenty-two other counts but the execution of those sentences was stayed pursuant to the Penal Code.”
Before the hearing, Fall denied a motion for a new trial submitted by Dev’s attorney Michael Rothschild. Fall also denied a motion for bail pending appeal, saying there was no clear and convincing evidence showing Dev was unlikely to flee while on bail.
“There is no doubt in my mind that Mr. Dev, who was sentenced to nearly 400 years, was wrongly convicted and is an innocent man,” Rothschild said. He has filed a notice of appeal with the 3rd District Court of Appeal.
About 100 of Dev’s family and friends and members of the local Nepali community attended the sentencing hearing in a show of support. The victim did not attend. Three of Dev’s supporters made statements to the court on his behalf, each reiterating their belief in the defendant’s moral character and that he was incapable of committing the heinous crimes he was convicted of. Dev also addressed the court with an emotional plea of innocence that drew tears from several supporters.
One representative statement from Dev’s family and friends stated:
“It goes beyond reason that Ajay could be found not guilty on some counts, thereby abrogating the accuser’s account of events, and found guilty on others. The real victims are: an innocent man who has lost his freedom and is sitting in jail, a pregnant wife and young child who are bereft of their husband and father, parents who have witnessed the degradation of their son, and the many other family members and friends who have lost a source of spiritual strength, friendship, and inspiration.”
A native of Nepal, Dev had immigrated to the Davis area with his parents at age 13. He graduated from Chico State and worked for the California Water Resources Board as an engineer. In 1999, Dev and his wife brought the victim, a distant relative of Dev’s, to the United States. She lived with them and they provided for her education. They officially adopted the victim, who was 15 at the time, in December 1999.
According to the victim’s testimony, Dev began inappropriately touching her with the first few weeks of her arrival and later progressed to forced sexual assault and rape on a weekly basis. The assaults allegedly continued till the victim moved out of the Dev household in December 2004. According to a Yolo County press release, the victim reported the situation to the Davis Police Department after Dev threatened to get a gun and shoot himself and the victim if he didn’t allow him to continue to abuse her.
However, the case against Dev was not filed until two years later, in 2006, because the victim had returned to Nepal to attend her sister’s wedding and was imprisoned there on charges brought about by a relative alleging she had the wrong date of birth on her passport. The U.S. Embassy in Nepal and Davis law enforcement helped the victim return to the U.S where she filed charges.
Dev was remanded to custody without bail in 2009 after having been free on bail for the three years it took to get the case to trial. The trial lasted for two months, and the jury convicted Dev on 76 counts.
Rothschild argued that Fall’s sentence is excessive, whether Dev is guilty or innocent, and constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. Dev’s family and supporters continue to maintain he is not guilty of sexually assaulting his adopted daughter.
In a letter to Judge Fall, Tom Grothe, a friend who has known the Dev family for 21 years, wrote:
“[The victim’s] claims are outrageous lies. For example, she claimed that she was raped when they spent the night in our Monterey home. I witnessed them sleep in different rooms in a tiny 2-bedroom house with 2 dogs and open doors. I witnessed the girl wake up, after allegedly being raped, and wedge herself on the couch between her adopted parents.”
Dev’s supporters also claim the prosecution had limited and vague evidence, including a lack of physical evidence and contradictory testimony by the victim. They have created a Web site, www.advocatesforajay.com, and intend to continue fighting to prove his innocence.
Roystom Sim is a recent graduate from the University of Wisconsin in Journalism. He is currently an intern for the Vanguard.
Either way I read the story, innocent or guilty, it’s sickening. This is where I hope the justice system really gets it right.
I am reading John Grisham’s nonfiction book The Innocent Man – an account of four innocent people found guilty of a crime they did not commit, bc of the incompetence of our legal system. It is truly frightening. Have no idea whether Dev is guilty or not, but find it somewhat hard to believe bc of no prior criminal record, and his educational level – he could have easily hired a prostitute to carry out kinky sexual fantasies. That said, it will be nearly impossible to get his conviction overturned, but it can happen. Would suggest family members read the above mentioned book…
I have no idea whether Ajay is innocent or guilty, but we rented the house that this was supposed to have happened in from the Dev’s in 2007. I do have to admit they were strange and I always thought that they must have been in legal trouble before because they always documented everything and gave us letters addressed as “Dear Tenants.” I can’t comment on anything related to this case other than they were very dishonest with us. We rented the house starting Sept 2007. In March 2008 they sent us a letter saying that they were selling the house. I called the previous renters and the Dev’s had told them they had intended to sell the house in the summer of 2008, but they never told us when we signed the lease. We had even mentioned we had hoped to live there for the 5 years we would be in Davis, but they never said anything to us. It was a very bad experience with them.
This is really disturbing. I hope the Vanguard continues to cover this story. I’d love to learn more.
This is horrific and ridicules to say the least. The accusations are horrific and if there was solid proof that something had happened then the courts got it right. The problem is there was NO concrete evidence of the accusations and there is solid evidence that the accuser was fraudulent on various occasions with both the Nepalese Government and the United States. I am sorry but I believe that the accuser should be the one being investigated and Ajay be released immediately. This is a sad day for me and I do not even know Ajay personally. Unfortunately I do know the Davis police department as I was raised in Davis, They are the ones that should be sad for putting an innocent man in jail for the rest of his life. He submitted top a polygraph for Gods sake and past it. Again this is a very sad day.
Cohassion, the victim did not fill out the immigration paperwork on her own. If there were any inconsistencies on the information filed, it was done with the help of Ajay and Peggy Dev. Similarly, it was a close relative of Ajay’s who notified the authorities of the inconsistencies on her passport; it was NOT through the “conscientious” efforts of Nepalese airport security. Also, polygraph tests often produce inconsistent results, and are rarely used as a form of evidence in courtrooms.
I knew the family personally, and the terms used to describe him by his blind followers were completely false and disgustingly insulting to hear. He is an arrogant man who prides himself for his educational merits. Normally, one would commend him for his accomplishments, but his outrageous conceit led him to believe that he was invincible and able to do whatever his greedy, degenerate heart desired without any thought to the consequences of his behaviors.
I agree with the fact that many Davis police officers are SOBs, but it was the District Attorney who was in charge of making sure this perverted transgressor paid the ultimate price for his reprehensible actions, and not the Davis PD. The Davis PD did their job (for once in their lives) by following the orders of the court: to put this pathetic excuse of a man in prison for a crime that he DID commit.
A word of caution: Do not believe everything that you read on Ajay’s website. The people who have created this site want to put Ajay in the best light possible, and have added their own erroneous biases in order to attempt to accomplish this. They only list partial evidence to try to uphold his “innocence,” and paint a very one-sided picture. The jurors have been very open about what went on in the courtroom throughout the entire trial, and it was they who decided that there was enough evidence–beyond a reasonable doubt–that he was guilty. Based on the information given on that website alone, the jurors would have found Ajay innocent. In other words, there was a myriad of incredibly damning evidence that pointed straight at Ajay. His conviction and sentencing were based on this, and not the ridiculous fluff that you may or may not be reading on that website.
I have not heard of anyone escaping a polygraph test. I think the DA knew that he was innocent but pursued the case anyway. This is really disturbing. Any government official in power has a responsibility to be righteous. Government should not act like a defense attorney, to win the case no matter, forget racism or other things.
Read this: http://www.slideshare.net/Sheila.Berry/the-truth-about-wrongful-conviction
Now relate this to the case. A person’s life is no joke.
One of the first superfluous, albeit interesting tidbits of trivial information you learn in a basic psychology test is that polygraph tests are unreliable. I think any general psychology textbook will do. There was more than enough evidence to convict him, and again, I’ve know the family for a while now, and know how they interact.
Remember: People act differently in front of their peers than they do in front of their daughter’s friends.
Correction: “basic psychology class”–not test.
[i]Normally, one would commend him for his accomplishments, but his outrageous conceit led him to believe that he was invincible and able to do whatever his greedy, degenerate heart desired without any thought to the consequences of his behaviors.[/i]
Cassandra, you make some fair points here. He does come across as arrogant on his site, and there probably was some strong evidence of his guilt in the trial.
The problem is that it’s a leap from molesting a teenager and being arrogant to life in prison without parole. That’s the aspect of the outcome that gives me pause. This maximum sentence was not purely what the judge and jury decided, it’s also the product of mandatory sentencing laws. Also, unlike some types of judges, Timothy Fall has to run for office, and I don’t think that that helps his impartiality.
Greg: You and I are in a very similar place on this. What struck me last Friday was the severity of this sentence compared to others. Talking with a reporter yesterday, one of the points made is that this case never would have gotten this far in Sac County, it would have been plead out long ago.
You seem to know about this case well. Looking at things impartially, I strongly believe that there is something wrong. Why don’t you describe a crime that had a 400 years sentence. How does this case fair with that?
This is one of those cases you watch in movies and read in books. An abuse could be of many forms. Sex or Power. Open your windows and breathe some fresh air. And look all around and enjoy some independence and freedom. It is that what makes America great. Independent thinking. The freedom to stand up for what is right. If you see a potential for wrong doing by the powerful or the powerless, raise your eyebrows, no matter. Not just blindly believe that “The Police is always right”.
Again: http://www.slideshare.net/Sheila.Berry/the-truth-about-wrongful-conviction
[i]Talking with a reporter yesterday, one of the points made is that this case never would have gotten this far in Sac County, it would have been plead out long ago.[/i]
But is the issue which county, or which defendant? Certainly one problem with mandatory sentencing is that it squeezes more and more of the judicial process into plea bargaining. That’s a bad thing. But it’s also possible that Dev hates his adopted daughter Sapna and refused to admit to any wrongdoing at all or to apologize to her. So a key question is whether Reisig refused to plea bargain, or whether Dev rejected reasonable plea bargain offers.
Many people have wondered incredulously over the severity of the punishment. What many people also fail to remember is that Ajay was sentenced for EACH crime he committed, and that that number was approximately 76. For EACH of those 76 (Please correct me if this number is wrong.) counts, he received a specific number of years in prison. Added up, the sentence is what it is: 378 years and 4 months. In other words, Ajay is being punished for every time he raped his daughter. And again, there was overwhelming evidence that proved that Ajay was guilty of his disgusting crimes, otherwise the jurors would not have convicted him. Many times over, a handful of jurors repeatedly said to anyone who would listen: “We thought he was innocent at first. But, as the trial continued, and the evidence piled up, it was clear that this [guy] was guilty!” These impartial jurors who had nothing to do with the Davis Police Department, and convicted Ajay for his crimes UNANIMOUSLY.
Please stop bringing up the Davis Police Department. I’ve already conceded by agreeing with you that many of them are schmucks. However, the police had absolutely NOTHING to do with this crime.
And as for sex and power, Ajay knew that he had “power” over an innocent girl who had no ties in the U.S. outside of himself and his wife, and used said “power” to force himself upon that innocent girl. Ajay was able to get away with his “power”-trip induced fetishes for over 5 years because he had abused the poor girl into mental submission.
Instead of looking up on corrupt police cases that have nothing to do with this specific case, I suggest that you, instead, look up the statistics on victims of domestic abuse, and read carefully about rape victims, the psychological and emotional damage caused by such traumatic events, and in what scenarios these events most often take place. You will find that Ajay is a classic example of a “power”-hungry rapist who took advantage of someone supposedly weaker than him to feed his ego.
Thank you to everyone who is willing to keep an open mind and see both sides of the story, and not just the slant that this website stoops to serve. Please look at ALL of the information from the trial, and not just what is conveniently and biasedly located on Ajay’s supporters’ website.
Namaste.
“What many people also fail to remember is that Ajay was sentenced for EACH crime he committed, and that that number was approximately 76.”
And that’s a huge question in my mind, whether the sum total of those crimes is worse than killing an individual, whereby most convicted of that get far less than 378. Is the victim really worse off than being dead? Because in a way, that’s what this says.
In this instance, I would agree with you about the values our blind justice system holds. Usually, individuals who commit murder in the first degree are placed in prison for life. Or, if they have a particularly sleazy yet competent defense attorney, they get life with the possibility of parole. In Ajay’s case, and because I do have my own personal biases (i.e. That scumbag deserves to rot in hell for what he did to one of my best friends!), I see no harm in giving him a sentence of 378 years. Clearly, he won’t live for more than about 40 years, anyway, so tacking on a few hundred more years is just a technicality. The reality is that he will be punished appropriately for his crime (for killing the innocence of a very young girl). It IS too bad that the U.S. justice system doesn’t revolve around a Hammurabi-esque ideal, but well, I’ll take what I can get.
[i]I see no harm in giving him a sentence of 378 years.[/i]
I have no particular sympathy for Dev as a human being. I don’t know him, and for all I know he’s as bad as you describe. I also take very seriously that a jury concluded that he was guilty. But even accepting all that, there sure is a lot of harm to life without parole. There is real moral harm and there is real financial harm.
One moral setback is that the state has decided that it’s not interested in repentance or self-improvement. If this sentence stands, then it is saying to Dev: “Do you repent for your crime? Do you want to make yourself a better person by helping victims in need, by speaking out against the type of crime you committed, or otherwise by doing good? You may want to do that after 5 or 10 years, but as far as we’re concerned, tough. You’re worthless. You’re a menace to society forever no matter what you become behind bars.”
Maybe if Dev was a mafia boss who killed five people, he would deserve that response from the state. And I don’t defend molesting a teenager even for a second: It’s a very serious crime that may well merit prison. But throwing Dev away as a person in response to that seems over the top. The man has a mother, and he has a wife and children. Maybe it leaves me cold if they keep claiming that he’s completely innocent, but they have the right to value him as a flawed human being.
Another moral hazard is that it’s very important to punish people for what they actually do, and not to convict them of a fiction because we hate them. That is a bad slippery slope. Dev was sentenced as if he yanked 70 different women off of the street and raped each one. What he was actually convicted of doing was outrageous, but it wasn’t that. Especially if you bring in phrases like “mental submission”, it does not make it sound like the punishment fits the crime.
It would be one thing if a punishment like this were cheap, but it’s not cheap at all. In some place without mandatory sentencing, Dev might be sentenced to 5 or 10 years for a crime like this. Then for the cost of the remaining 20-25 years of his sentence in California, the state could pay for college for 10 or 20 people. Or chemotherapy for 10 or 20 poor people with cancer. Is it worth all that to keep avenging one victim?
You forget that Ajay has shown no remorse or admitted to the terrible things that he’s done. Do you honestly believe that he, a very proud and stubborn individual, will “stoop” to speak out about what he has done to my friend, and how to prevent actions like these from ever happening again? Sadly, we do not live in a world where justice is met, where fairness prevails, and where honest, law-abiding tax payers do not have to take the financial burden of paying for a rapist’s life-long stay in prison. However, it is the price we pay in order to make our streets safer, and from a moral standpoint, discourage behaviors like these from occurring again.
As for the phrase “mental submission,” if you had paid any attention to an earlier comment that I made, I suggested that you go onto any educational government facilitated website that speaks about rape victims, and what actually happens to them psychologically and emotional. Ajay took advantage of my friend when she was in a very vulnerable position, and manipulated the situation to his advantage. He constantly threatened her so that she would not go to the authorities, which is a classic form of manipulations these transgressors use to keep their victims quiet. THAT is the “mental submission” that I was talking of.
Also, do you mean to tell me that raping 70 individual women is more heinous than continuously raping your own daughter 70 consecutive times?? What is your rationale behind this kind of thinking??
And lastly, Peggy, Ajay’s wife, got pregnant knowing full well what her husband had done, but did it anyway at the urging of their disgusting defense attorney to try and elicit some form of sympathy from the judge and jury. She is as guilty as Ajay for turning a blind eye to what was going on in her own home, and so your reasoning behind his having a family who accepts him for a flawed individual is without merit. Remember: she still maintains that he is innocent, and refuses to see the truth for what it really is. Again, she does not accept Ajay as a “flawed human being” because she keeps on touting his innocence with her ridiculous appeals to the public.
This is not simply about avenging “one victim,” either. It is about cleaning up our streets and removing filth like Ajay Dev and other child molesters. They have no place in our society, especially those who cannot and will not accept responsibility for their actions, and choose, instead, to hide behind a sub-culture that has a history of downplaying this kind of deviant misogynistic behavior.
Correction: “culture”–not subculture
“One moral setback is that the state has decided that it’s not interested in repentance or self-improvement. If this sentence stands…”
What you forget, David, is that the reason why the state has refused to incorporate rehabilitation as a part of the sentencing is because IT DOESN’T WORK. There are plenty of programs developed over the years that have spent millions of taxpayers’ dollars with the hopes of “repenting” criminals back into society. Sadly, every one of these programs have been a waste, yielding little to no success. Any basic Criminology class will tell you this!
And I cannot emphasize this enough: If a perpetrator is not willing to admit guilt–will not acknowledge and recognize that he has a serious problem–then there is no reason to move forward in the “rehabilitation” process. You are, in essence, at an impasse, and your well-intentioned theory is left with the rest of those rehabilitation programs.
“One moral setback is that the state has decided that it’s not interested in repentance or self-improvement. If this sentence stands…”
What you forget, David, is that the reason why the state has refused to incorporate rehabilitation as a part of the sentencing is because IT DOESN’T WORK. There are plenty of programs developed over the years that have spent millions of taxpayers’ dollars with the hopes of “repenting” criminals back into society. Sadly, every one of these programs have been a waste, yielding little to no success. Any basic Criminology class will tell you this!
And I cannot emphasize this enough: If a perpetrator is not willing to admit guilt–will not acknowledge and recognize that he has a serious problem–then there is no reason to move forward in the “rehabilitation” process. You are, in essence, at an impasse, and your well-intentioned theory is left with the rest of those useless rehabilitation programs.
Woops! Didn’t mean to press the button twice, heh.
Oh, and I’m sorry. I addressed the last few comments to David, when they were really aimed at Greg. Apologies!
[i]You forget that Ajay has shown no remorse or admitted to the terrible things that he’s done.[/i]
It was supposed to be the point of prison, to give people time to repent. The new purpose of prison with this verdict is, “Since you didn’t repent 20 years ago, we don’t care what you have to say now, you’re just an animal in a cage.” I can understand your anger as a friend of this victim, but that’s taking things too far.
I found out from Megan’s law that there are convicted rapists who live near my house. These some old men who look a lot like other old men, but typically back in the 1960s they did some horrible perverted things to some girls. I understand why these men needed to go to prison. But when I look at them now, I don’t see the need to keep treating them like they committed their crimes last week. I just don’t see the point.
[i]What you forget is that the reason why the state has refused to incorporate rehabilitation as a part of the sentencing is because IT DOESN’T WORK.[/i]
If criminals once are criminals forever, then here is a modest proposal: Why not just kill them all off. Why bother with prisons at all.
[i]Also, do you mean to tell me that raping 70 individual women is more heinous than continuously raping your own daughter 70 consecutive times?[/i]
I can read about militias who raped 70 women in a village in Bosnia. I’m not going to tell people in that village that what we have is just as bad. Yes we have criminals, and according to the court Dev is one of them. But it’s not the same thing.
[i]Ajay’s wife, got pregnant knowing full well what her husband had done[/i]
Here you are really overstepping. There are places in Nepal where the whole family is viewed as guilty for what one member did. That’s not the way that it should be in the United States. Regardless of how deluded Peggy Dev is, she’s not a criminal. And her children are not defense tactics, they are people. It’s her right to have these children.
[i]This is not simply about avenging “one victim,” either. It is about cleaning up our streets[/i]
When I look at a country such as Canada that does not have rigid mandatory sentencing laws, I do not see that we in California do a better job of cleaning up our streets than they do. On the contrary, restraint is very important for public safety. Without restraint, ultimately we’ll hang everything on plea bargaining and make DAs local lords. Again, there’s some of that in Nepal, and it does not make them safe.
“What you forget, David, is that the reason why the state has refused to incorporate rehabilitation as a part of the sentencing is because IT DOESN’T WORK.”
I know this was intended for Greg, but I’ll respond because frankly I don’t think rehabilitation has really been tried. There was an interesting discussion last year that got lost in land use issues over the Reentry Facility, and that was for the first an acknowledgement that we don’t really put a lot of effort or money into rehabilitation, into giving people actual tools to avoid the same trap. Now sex crimes are a bit different, but as Greg pointed out he was also not targeting the general population. At worst it was a crime of opportunity. Not to dismiss it in the least.
Finally, I have trouble with the issue of remorse because it means no one can argue for innocence, because that’s a failure to show remorse. But what if he is actually innocent and wrongfully convicted? Does that give us a paradoxical situation where we punish innocent people more than guilty because innocent people don’t show remorse? I am not really comfortable with that and thus not comfortable with using remorse as a guideline for punishment. People can show faux remorse as well. People should be punished for what they did, not who they are or how they respond.
If guilty of this I think a 10 to 20 year sentence would have been appropriate, 378 makes a mockery of our system.
This has been fun, fellas. It’s been enlightening to banter about the lives of others on the public forum of a tabloid-esque online “newspaper,” but I have my own to get back to. I thank you for your time and opinions.
Namaste.
Oh, and incidentally, if this had happened to any other individual whom I was not affiliated with in any way, I’d still feel the same way. C’est la vie.
I have yet to hear a rational explanation from his family or friends regarding the comment made in the phone call. They claim that this statement was taken out of context and not understood correctly.. The comment being “You F$#ked me after the age of 18, that means you gave consent”. I have no idea in what context, that comment would be appropriate for a father to say to his daughter. If anyone can come up with a logical and believable explanation, please let me know….
[i]I have yet to hear a rational explanation from his family or friends regarding the comment made in the phone call.[/i]
If I had to defend this guy at his funeral — which is not the same as defending someone in court — I would guess that he viewed his relationship with this girl as an arranged marriage, and not as adopting a daughter. The idea in his mind may have been, she gets a green card and he gets a mistress. Of course, that is an unacceptable and criminal arrangement by American standards, and by my standards. If that’s what it was, the girl had every right to hate it and to go to the police.
There are still some arranged marriages in Nepal. According to one reference that I found, the bride can legally be as young as 16 and that sometimes gets bent. In theory the girls consent to their marriages. In practice, in any such society it ranges from real consent, to simple assent, to accepting ruin because they have no choice. Admittedly it is less common among highly educated Nepalese. In this case it would have been polygamous, which is also not all that common in Nepal. Also there is a difference between a real arrangement between families and one man dictating the rules.
Again, I’m not saying that any of this should be remotely legal. But here’s a comparison. There was the horrible FLDS town on the border between Arizona and Utah in which teenage girls were forced into polygamous marriages with older men. That might not be any better than the allegations in this case. I have been hoping that some of the men who “married” those girls would go to prison. But no one is talking life without parole for them.
[url]http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=271552&rel_no=1[/url]
“You seem to know about this case well. Looking at things impartially, I strongly believe that there is something wrong. Why don’t you describe a crime that had a 400 years sentence. How does this case fair with that?”
what doesnt make sense is how this guy only got like 5 years and it’s the upper term or limit of the sentenced and he mollested a 6 yr old and another girl:
http://lakeconews.com/content/view/2095/702/
not every child molester or even child killer (and I believe this girl was a teenager?) is raped or killed in prison. Just read about the Polly Class killer and rapist and 3 strike creator. He is so horrid looking no other prisoner I believe wants to even be near him to rape him. Anyone got any reports of him (career inmate and criminal) ever being raped? here is a pic of him:
http://www.ccadp.org/richarddavis.htm
do you guys seriously think he looks like easy picking and a rape victim? he probably is the one doing the raping.
To S. Pali, Purveyor of the Redundant (Part 1):
Here are my answers to your overtly illiterate questions:
1. I assume you knew her for years, did she tell you that she was being raped all the years?
No, she never told me about it. I have since learned that many rape victims often feel ashamed about what has been done to them, and rarely want to talk about it. They feel as though they are somehow responsible for what has happened to them, and feel as though they could have prevented it. Clearly, that was never the case. The victim could have never prevented what had happened to her, nor could she have in any way been responsible for the sick acts Ajay performed upon her.
2. why did she not report it?
Again, she felt humiliated and violated, and didn’t want to add feeling exposed to the long list of horrible things she was feeling.
3. If she shared it with you, why did you not report it?
She never shared any of this with me. She wanted a normal life so badly, and was ashamed at what happened to her (again, as many rape victims irrationally feel), so she told no one what had been happening to her—not even me, her true friend who has undergone much harassment from the Nepali community and even Peggy Dev herself. Who went to visit the victim every day that she was in California for the trial? Who stood by the victim’s side throughout it all? ME. In fact, if I remember correctly, I was the only one who called her regularly to see how she was doing while she was being held against her will in Nepal.
4. is it not a crime to be be aware of the crime and do nothing about it on your part?
I am not familiar with the law concerning these situations, but if I had been cognizant of the fact, I believe that it would be a crime, but again, I knew nothing of what was happening to my friend. Your questions are becoming more cyclical and redundant the further along this list I go…
To S. Pali, Purveyor of the Redundant (Part 2):
5. Or, did she lie to you as well and only conveniently tell you when she decided to revenge against Ajay when he interfered with her relationship with a guy. Perhaps, she did not consider you much of a friend. I find it amazing, that the entire Nepali community and all the family friends who interacted with her and the entire family all the time never ever had any hint of the phantom rapes that she claimed but some how we are to believe you for the facts. No thank you.
I met face-to-face with both young men who dated the victim—the two young men that Ajay TERRORIZED while each of them dated her. They both spoke of how Ajay constantly harassed them, calling them at all hours of the day/night, calling their family members, threatening one man with deportation, “anonymous” calls to the FBI for the possibility of “terrorists” living in Davis etc., etc. The list is virtually endless. The Caucasian man who dated the victim told me that he and the victim decided to break up with each other because they felt that it would be in his best interests, and for his and his family’s own safety. He specifically told me, “Dude, that guy is f*cking CRAZY!!” You’re very welcome.
6. Let me ask you, what kind of friend were you to her if she was sharing the apparent rapes that were taking place and you did nothing about it, even if she did not. You did not go to the authorities, you told no one in general community or to the Nepali community. Perhaps you were not really her friend and just want to join the discussion for some frivolous attention and to show frivolous friendship support.
Again, your questions are redundant. Read above.
7. Let me also ask you, if were a real friend, were you in the court every day of the trial? did you gather all the facts from both sides? obviously no, but yet you claim to know the truth. If, not read the facts I provided below. Get your facts straight, read the court documents, talk to the people of the entire community that were involved in her life day in day out, much more than you ever were.
8. If you were there every day of the damn trial, you would know that I tried to be there for the victim, but because of the sleazy defense attorney’s underhanded tactics, I was told by the judge that I was not allowed to be present during the trial because I was a “potential witness.” Unfortunately, the defense attorney was also incompetent, because I was never served my subpoena. If I had, I would have surely been the last nail in Ajay’s coffin. And, correlation does not equal causation. There have been many instances throughout history where the ignorant masses followed the words of one individual because they did not know better. This is a bit of a stretch, but Hitler is the first name that comes to mind. Just because you and your masses follow the lies of one man does not deem him innocent by any means. Look at the facts—the entire facts—yourself, and you will see that the truth, indeed, has come out—in the conviction, and in the sentencing.
9. So, before you talk, be ready to provide the community the facts. Just what the world needs, a fake friend.
You know so little of the victim, so little of what she’s gone through, and are so ignorant and refuse to educate yourself on 1.) the real facts provided by the victim, the jurors and the DDA (not the skewed b*llsh*t that is provided by Ajay and his ridiculously blind followers), and 2.) rape victims in general (read any pamphlet at any social service office/hospital/high school, etc.). Otherwise you would not be asking such asinine, blatantly ignorant questions. What the world really needs is for rapists like Ajay Dev to be removed from our streets, and for his blind, arrogant followers to realize that the real truth has been spoken. Now is not the time for surfeit pride, but for humble acceptance and perhaps a long-overdue apology to the victim. Oh, and I myself have offered tons of facts on many of these forums. Please pull your head out of your butthole, and perhaps then you’ll be able to realize that, if a=b, and b=c, then, yes, a MUST = c.
“No matter how far you’ve gone down the wrong road, turn back.” –Turkish Proverb
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-10-01/how-young-is-too-young/
http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?at_code=437535&no=385704&rel_no=1
http://www.newkerala.com/news/fullnews-26628.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/30/sharon-tates-sister-sex-w_n_304042.html?page=6&show_comment_id=31956414
hypocricity much?