In March 1989 a group of teenage boys lured a mentally handicapped girl into a basement in Glen Ridge, New Jersey, and raped her. Glen Ridge was the kind of peaceful, affluent suburb many Americans dream about. The rapists were its most popular high school athletes. And although rumors of the crime quickly spread through the town, weeks passed before anyone saw fit to report it to the police.
What made these boys capable of brutalizing a girl that some of them had known since childhood? Why did so many of their elders deny the rape and rally around its perpetrators? To solve this riddle, the Edgar award-winning author Bernard Lefkowitz conducted years of research and more than two hundred interviews. The result is not just a wrenching story of crime and punishment, but a hauntingly nuanced portrait of America's jock culture and the hidden world of unrestrained adolescent sexuality.
Format:
Pages:
516 pages
Publication:
Publisher:
Vintage Books
Edition:
readers' edition
Language:
eng
ISBN10:
0375702695
ISBN13:
9780375702693
kindle Asin:
B003AU4G7K
Our Guys: The Glen Ridge Rape and the Secret Life of the Perfect Suburb
In March 1989 a group of teenage boys lured a mentally handicapped girl into a basement in Glen Ridge, New Jersey, and raped her. Glen Ridge was the kind of peaceful, affluent suburb many Americans dream about. The rapists were its most popular high school athletes. And although rumors of the crime quickly spread through the town, weeks passed before anyone saw fit to report it to the police.
What made these boys capable of brutalizing a girl that some of them had known since childhood? Why did so many of their elders deny the rape and rally around its perpetrators? To solve this riddle, the Edgar award-winning author Bernard Lefkowitz conducted years of research and more than two hundred interviews. The result is not just a wrenching story of crime and punishment, but a hauntingly nuanced portrait of America's jock culture and the hidden world of unrestrained adolescent sexuality.