according to a statement<\/a> released by Clackamas County.<\/p>\n\u201cThese last few years have often felt like a weight that I\u2019ve had to drag behind me, a constant reminder of the trauma that I haven\u2019t been able to fully work through because there was no ending in sight,\u201d she said. \u201cAt the time of the assault, I had no idea who Mr. McLemore was. When I found out \u2026 I questioned whether I should really move forward and report what had happened, especially given his status.<\/p>\n
\u201cI came forward to hold him accountable for the harm he caused, to ensure that what happened to me never happens to anyone else. No one is above the law, no matter who they are or what position they hold.\u201d<\/p>\n
The incident occurred Oct. 3, 2021, after a party at then-teammate Robert Covington\u2019s house in Lake Oswego. Prosecutor and First Assistant District Attorney Scott Healy Scott Healy told jurors the woman had been drinking heavily, passed out on a living room couch, then regained partial consciousness when McLemore sexually penetrated her with his fingers, then began having sexual intercourse with her.<\/p>\n
The woman was \u201cfading in and out\u201d of consciousness, frightened and traumatized, Healy said. Later that day, she sought a specialized medical examination for victims of sexual assault.<\/p>\n
\u201c(The defendant) needs to be held accountable for what he did,\u201d the woman said during her trial testimony. \u201cYou can\u2019t do that to somebody, let alone somebody that you don\u2019t know either. You don\u2019t do that to people and just be able to get away with it. I don\u2019t care who you are.\u201d<\/p>\n
Healy hopes the sentence will \u201cserve as a reminder that this type of conduct will not be tolerated.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully, the victim\u2019s strength and courage in this case will give others the fortitude to come forward in circumstances where sexual assault has occurred,\u201d Healy said.<\/p>\n
McLemore\u2019s attorneys disputed the victim\u2019s account of events, saying she initiated sexual contact and consented to it. His attorneys asserted that although the victim and McLemore were intoxicated at the time of the encounter, the victim was sober enough to consent.<\/p>\n
The seventh pick in the 2013 NBA Draft by the Sacramento Kings, McLemore played for the Memphis Grizzlies, Houston Rockets and Los Angeles Lakers before his last season with the Trail Blazers in 2021-22. He recently played professionally overseas in Europe, China and Turkey.<\/p>\n
(Photo: Steph Chambers \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A judge sentenced former NBA guard Ben McLemore to 100 months in prison Wednesday, a week after he…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":53296,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[1260,3133,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-53295","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-nba","9":"tag-portland-trail-blazers","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114827275291211921","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}