Free Missoula by Jon Krakauer

her.”
    After interviewing Beau Donaldson for just under an hour, Detective Baker returned Donaldson’s cell phone and allowed him to call his father. Then Baker placed Donaldson under arrest and drove him to the Missoula County jail, where he was booked on a felony charge of sexual intercourse without consent—the legal term for rape in Montana. Bond was initially set at $100,000. By this time, Donaldson’s father had arranged for a prominent Missoula attorney, Milt Datsopoulos, to represent Beau. Datsopoulos had assisted many University of Montana athletes with their legal problems over the years—so many, in fact, that Griz fans often joked, “If you’re guilty, call Uncle Milty!” Extremely unhappy that Donaldson had talked to Detective Baker without an attorney, Datsopoulos phoned Baker while Donaldson was being booked and told him that under no circumstances could he speak further with Donaldson.
    Detective Baker is a large man with a comportment that can be intimidating, but he is uncommonly empathic. He appreciates how difficult it can be for a rape victim to go to the police. He knows that the criminal justice system frequently compounds the trauma of being raped and, way too often, fails to hold rapists accountable. So instead of phoning Allison Huguet to tell her that Beau Donaldson had been arrested, Baker and Detective Blood drove across town to Office Solutions & Services to notify Huguet in person that Donaldson was in jail and had given them a full confession.
    At 8:11 that evening, an hour before Baker had even broken thenews to Huguet, a disappointed Grizzly supporter using the screen name “grizfan1984” announced on a popular Internet forum, eGriz.com ,
Just read the jail roster and Beau Donaldson has been arrested again this time for sexual intercourse without consent aka rape, $100,000 bail looks like he won’t be playing for the griz anymore.
    At 9:31, someone with the screen name “grizindabox” posted,
It cannot be true, he is from Montana!
    At 10:43, “PlayerRep” posted,
I know nothing about the facts, but I know Donaldson and I have doubts that rape occurred or that this will stick. I think Donaldson is a good kid. I know good kids can be caught up with date rape-type things too, but my instincts tell me that he didn’t rape anyone.
    In the middle of the night, an article by Gwen Florio about Donaldson’s arrest went up on the
Missoulian
website, impelling an angry Griz supporter calling himself “Sportin’ Life” to post the following about Donaldson’s arrest on eGriz at 5:08 a.m.:
This has got to be Gwen Florio’s fault entirely. This is really a new low for her, stooping to this just to push her anti-football agenda.
    At 9:08 a.m., “jcu27” posted,
First off, chicks exaggerate on rape. Second off, she could sucked his dick and still got rape just because she said she didn’t want it later on. Third off, no justice system actually works. Only the people involved actually know what happened. And a lot of people lie.
    ----
    * 1 pseudonym
    * 2 pseudonym

PART TWO
    Before the Law Sits a Gatekeeper
    We can finally all agree that women want to have sex. Variously portrayed in the past as tamers of men and tenders of children, we’re now deemed well endowed with horniness. But does that mean we experience desire in the same way that men do? My lust tells me we don’t. Mine, I confess, isn’t blind or monumental or animal. It comes with an endless internal monologue—or maybe dialogue, or maybe babel. My desire is always guessing, often second-guessing. Female lust is a powerful force, but it surges in the form of an interrogation, rather than a statement. Not
I want this
but
Do I want this? What exactly do I want? How about now? And now?
    C LAIRE D EDERER
“Why Is It So Hard for Women to Write About Sex?”
The Atlantic
, March 2014

CHAPTER SIX
          T he thumping heart of downtown Missoula is a compact grid of shops, offices, government agencies, restaurants, and