Victor Pena was sentenced to 29-39 years in Suffolk Superior Court on Monday for the horrific rape and kidnap of a girl he held captive in his condo. The girl’s sufferer affect assertion is beneath:
Victim Impact Statement
“Describe the impact that this crime has had on you”.
There aren’t any phrases to explain how this has impacted me. How am I imagined to articulate one thing that has utterly turned my world the other way up? When I take into consideration how this affected me, I take into consideration how I by no means totally got here again from these days. Part of me died in that condo and I mourn for the life I might have lived-was imagined to stay.
I’ve spent the higher a part of the previous three and a half years attempting to take up the least quantity of area attainable. Trying to suit the picture of the proper survivor – frightened that somebody was watching my each transfer. Acting if all the things was wonderful. Trying to face in the best place in order that the shadow that follows me appears to be like half the dimensions that it’s.
I’m so exhausted. I’ve had mates come as much as me since, sharing their tales with me and it breaks my coronary heart each single time. It crushes me to know the ache they went by means of, and know that little to none of them will get the justice they deserve. No one ought to must know what this seems like, an insufferable heaviness that you simply can’t escape from. No one deserves to have their very own self taken from them. I ought to have spent my twenties laughing, assembly new individuals, celebrating.
Instead I spent in court docket rooms, testifying, ready, dreading. In the years since my trauma, I felt like I used to be continually being adopted by a darkish shadow – reminding me of the horrors I went by means of, in addition to ensuring all the things else was to disintegrate alongside it.
After three and a half years, I wasn’t certain if this nightmare would ever finish. At each replace there appeared to be one other disruption or delay, making me really feel trapped, as if I by no means really escaped in any respect. I learn a ebook that described it properly as soon as – generally it’s like I’m a customer in my very own physique. My physique was taken away from me. Something that was mine by means of and thru was taken away and it’s nonetheless not again.
There’s no treatment to discomfort I discover in my very own physique at occasions. I can wrap myself in blankets and distract myself with TV, however it’s nonetheless there. The concept of ever being really intimate with somebody after this appears laughable.
What they don’t inform you if you find yourself assaulted, is that afterwards, nothing feels protected, even the day by day actions you’ve been doing for years. I’ve slept with a knife in my bedside desk and a discipline hockey stick behind my mattress, and nonetheless I frightened at night time. I took self-defense/martial arts lessons to learn to defend myself and nonetheless I’m afraid.
I’m afraid on the sidewalk, I’m afraid on the T, I’m afraid each time I’m not someplace I do know. I get panicked each time another person is driving – I’m satisfied we are going to get in an accident. I take into consideration all of the methods I might die and I really feel the concern I did again then. Whenever I enter a room I go searching to verify I can see the exits and get a learn of the individuals within the room. I strategically sit with my again to the wall, making certain that nobody can come up behind me. I’ve a again up plan for my again up plan as a result of I’m all the time frightened one thing will go improper. I flip down plans as a result of they’re both at night time or I’m frightened I gained’t have the ability to get dwelling safely.
Right after all the things occurred, I needed to take three months off of labor. During that point I principally solely watched TV – I used to be a shell of myself and I needed to distract myself from what had occurred. I typically nonetheless select to observe TV at dwelling then go and socialize with mates – it’s the safer possibility. I shut myself off from the individuals I care about. I finished replying to texts, and at present there are individuals I do know who reached out that I by no means responded to. I advised nearly nobody concerning the trial and didn’t reply if individuals reached out. I didn’t even speak to my dad and mom about it. It was so painful, I needed to fake it wasn’t taking place to get by means of.
I’ll always remember the way in which that somebody checked out me the primary time I got here again to work – a mixture of shock and pity. I’ll always remember how terrible I felt in that second. It felt as if they didn’t see me, however solely noticed what occurred to me. I consider that second rather a lot, particularly over the previous few weeks as I’ve tried to navigate work and the trial. I’ve labored so laborious to indicate everybody I’m extra than simply what occurred to me, however I do know that for some individuals I’ll all the time be that woman who bought raped. The disgrace, that shouldn’t be mine, feels continually draped over my shoulders and I’m unable to shake it off. I can’t discuss what occurred, except I completely must. Even then it’s painful and I attempt to concentrate on different issues as a lot as attainable. I try to act as if nothing ever occurred once I’m round different individuals, however it replays and pops into my head with out warning.
I can’t even write a full affect assertion – simply fragments of paragraphs and disjointed ideas. So a lot harm has been completed, and I nonetheless can’t discuss it, quantify it, spend time serious about it. I don’t need to take into consideration the issues I’ve misplaced: a way of lightness, the flexibility to be carefree, to really feel like a traditional individual somewhat than simply somebody pretending to be regular.
I’m offended all the time – offended at my household for asking how I’m, offended at them for wanting to return with me to conferences and the trial. I simply need to erase the ache of this from everybody’s thoughts, as a result of I wasn’t the one one who was harm. I get offended serious about the place I might have been by now, the place I might have lived, who I might have met. I’m offended that this trial has been postponed a number of occasions and now’s solely nearing the conclusion three and a half years later.
This is a horrifying chapter that I’ve wished to shut from the second that it began and I can’t. I’m offended that I needed to put the items of my life again collectively and I’m offended that they don’t match again the identical approach as they used to. I’ve been attempting to determine a option to finish this, however I don’t suppose there’s.
There won’t ever be an finish to the variety of methods this has destroyed my life.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”