Social Media Casts Spotlight on Alleged Rape
BLITZER: A correction to a story we brought you a while ago on those medical helicopter crashes. According to the NTSB, the National Transportation Safety Board, Air Methods Corporation, that's the company involved in the crash in Oklahoma yesterday has had 12 crashes since 2007, 2007 with 20 deaths. Showing video social media messages are at the heart of criminal charges against two Ohio high school football players charged with raping a 16-year-old girl. CNN national correspondent Susan Candiotti is joining us with details of what is going on. What are you learning, Susan?</s>SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Wolf, two star high school athletes face horrific allegations, that they raped a 16-year- old girl during parties to celebrate the end of summer last August in Steubenville, Ohio. The two teenagers face charges in juvenile court there next month. An attorney for one of the boys says his client and the alleged victim were boyfriend and girlfriend and that his client, in his words, did not rape anyone. His client is also charged with taking a nude photo or photos of a minor. But what makes this case stand out is an explosion of chatter about this on social media and even more so than that, Wolf, is all of the charges in the media that people are talking about this. Now we also wanted to tell you that there is also a videotape that we can play for you if we have it. That's been playing online, taken down and put back on where they are talking about this on social media.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What if that was your daughter?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But it isn't.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What if it was?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If that was my daughter, I wouldn't care. I would just let her be dead.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Listen to yourself.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm listening to myself fine.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In about ten years I'm going to come back.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ten years. My daughter's going to be getting raped and dead in ten years.</s>CANDIOTTI: Now, that continues for about 12 minutes. He goes on to make offensive one-line comments about rape and talks about the girl as if she was dead, which she isn't. Attorney -- Ohio's attorney general says he has been made aware of this video, but says it is not a crime to be stupid. Now police in part found out about the alleged rape by piecing together outrageous tweets, a cell phone photo that claims to show the girl at the center of the alleged attacked being carried seemingly limp by her arms and legs. And at least one online video that show young people callously laughing about it, Wolf.</s>BLITZER: What do we know, Susan, about the alleged victim's condition at the time of the incident?</s>CANDIOTTI: Well, Wolf, that's a key point of contention. Was she able to consent or did she consent to any alleged sexual activity? In open court, prosecutors say the two boys treated her, quote, "like a toy" and said, quote, "The bottom line is, we don't have to prove that she said no. We just have to prove that when they are doing things to her she's not moving. She's not responsive. And the evidence is consistent and clear," end quote. However, a defense attorney for one of the accused teens says consent is one of the things he'll argue over at trial. His client is under house arrest until then.</s>BLITZER: What about others that might be involved here?</s>CANDIOTTI: Ohio's Attorney General Mike Dawine says the investigation is not over. Authorities are still conducting interviews and he expects to close the case in a few weeks.</s>BLITZER: Pretty shocking stuff. Susan Candiotti, thank you for that report. A very emotional day here in Washington up on Capitol Hill for Senator Mark Kirk of Illinois. He triumphantly returned to work today one year, one year after suffering a debilitating stroke.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Welcome back. Yes.</s>BLITZER: That's Vice President Joe Biden and Kirk's fellow senator from Illinois Dick Durbin greeting him on the stairs of the capitol, helping him walk the rest of the way up. Dozens of senators cheered him on as he made his way up. Senator Kirk participated in intensive walking studies as part of his physical therapy. He basically had to relearn how to walk after suffering a severe stroke on the right side of his brain in January of last year. In July Kirk said, he quote, "walked an average of 3,677 steps per day."