My name is John and I am a 22 year old gay male, 5’10”, and 135 lbs. I have been raped twice in the last three years and sexually harassed for the past year and a half. I will go into each one of these separately.

At age 17. I was in county jail doing time for a violation of probation. This was my first time in jail and did not know what to expect. I became friends with another inmate about 39 years old. What I did not know was that he only spoke to me because he wanted to have sex with me. Every time he asked I told him NO. At the time of the sexual assault I was taking sleeping pills to sleep. The morning of the sexual assault my cell opened and I was still asleep. I was awoken when I felt some weight on my chest. When I opened my eyes I was naked and he was trying to orally sodomize me. I grabbed a pen and tried to stab him and he pulled up his pants and ran out of my cell. Two days later I told an officer I could trust and was moved to a cell that had an officer around 24-7.

The last part of my story starts at age 21 and ends at 22 years old. At this time I am in a state prison and was sexually assaulted (raped) by a 53 year old guy that could snap me in half. It took place in the shower. I was in the shower when he came in already naked and with a condom on his erect penis. He pushed me into the wall and started to insert his penis into my rectum. I tried to talk him out of it, but it did not work. I then zoned out to another place till it was over. I reported what he had done 10 months later when I was nowhere around him. Then the Inspector General officer came to see me and to write up my complaint. The Inspector General officer that came to see me and take my complaint said she thinks I am lying and threatened to put charges on me if I was lying. She was snotty about the whole thing and seemed not to care what happened or that I was still in shock and disbelief that this happened to me again. She has not gotten back to me yet and it has been almost 6 months now. I have thought it was my fault that these things were done to me, but since writing to JDI and reading their literature I have realized it was not my fault and I will make it through with help from JDI, my family and friends.

-John, New York