News

Chanel Miller says she was ‘shocked’ by short sentence for Brock Turner

Chanel Miller, the woman who was sexually assaulted by ex-Stanford University student Brock Turner, said she was “shocked” when she heard he was only sentenced to six months in jail.

During her first television interview, which aired Sunday on CBS’s “60 Minutes,” Miller detailed her experience after revealing her identity publicly for the first time earlier this month. She had previously been identified as “Emily Doe.”

{mosads}She now says she wants the world to know her name and face so she can raise awareness of sexual assault.

Miller said she was “shocked” when Turner received what she thinks was a light sentence in March 2016 from Judge Aaron Persky, in part because “there are young men, particularly young men of color, serving longer sentences for nonviolent crimes, for having a teenie-weenie bit of marijuana in their pockets.”

“And he’s [Turner] just been convicted of three felonies. And he’s gonna serve one month for each felony. How can you explain that to me?” she said.

Turner faced a maximum sentence of 14 years in prison after being convicted of three felony counts of sexual assault for the January 2015 rape. His sentence was later reduced for good behavior and he was out of jail in 90 days.

She also wanted to convey a message in her interview that “rape is not a punishment for getting drunk.”

“We have this really sick mindset in our culture as if you deserve rape if you drink to excess. You deserve a hangover, a really bad hangover, but you don’t deserve to have somebody insert their body parts inside of you,” she said.

Miller’s powerful statement at Turner’s sentencing was widely shared, but her name and face were never attached to it. She said she felt like now was the right time to publicly detail her experience.

Miller, a 27-year-old graduate of UC Santa Barbara, has a memoir titled “Know My Name” set to be released Tuesday.