Daisy Coleman, the northwest Missouri 16-year-old, whose alleged 2012 sexual assault in Maryville, garnered significant media attention, was recovering Tuesday from a suicide attempt, as reported by The Kansas City Star. Coleman was being treated at a Kansas City psychiatric hospital after ingesting unidentified pills on Sunday evening.
"It's been heartbreaking for them. This has been a really long, drawn-out battle, and it's heartbreaking to see something like this happening," said Robin Bourland, a longtime acquaintance of the Colemans, as also reported by The Kansas City Star.
Coleman's sexual assault case "gained national notoriety following an October story in The Star detailing the alleged sexual assault and the harassment that Coleman and her family received after making the allegations. In the story, Daisy Coleman's family said she previously had attempted suicide twice in the wake of that harassment, much of it on social media, some at Maryville High School, where she was a freshman," as reported by Kansas City Star.
Coleman's case centered on a January 2012 house party in which she along with a friend, 14 and 13 respectively at the time, "alleged they were sexually assaulted at the home of Matthew Barnett, then a 17-year-old Maryville High senior and the grandson of a former state representative. Barnett was arrested on charges of sexual assault and endangering the welfare of a child, the latter for allegedly leaving Coleman incapacitated by alcohol and barefoot in her yard in 30-degree temperatures," reported Kansas City Star.
17-year-old Jordan Zech was also charged with sexual exploitation of a minor, which involved using a friend's cellphone to film a portion of the encounter between Coleman and Barnett. (The case of a 15-year-old boy, who admitted having intercourse with the younger girl despite her repeated refusals, was handled in juvenile court.)
Charges were dropped against the two juvenile suspects two months later, citing a lack of evidence and, later, a lack of cooperation on the part of the alleged victims' families, according to news reports.
Jackson County prosecutor Jean Peters Baker was appointed to re-examine the case to determine whether fresh charges were warranted in October.
The 16-year-old received online harassment after attending a party over this past weekend, leading to her suicide attempt, as reported by Kansas City Star.
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