Lots to think about with Satterfield and Everson

We've got a long weekend to reflect on what we've learned so far in the sexual abuse trial of former Hawkeye football player Cedric Everson.

From the trial, maybe, would be a more accurate phrasing. But I'll save those thoughts while the jury's out.

The jury will have to sift through evidence and testimony to decide whether Everson is guilty of sexually assaulting a fellow UI student-athlete at the Hillcrest dorm in that 2007 case that captured national headlines and lost three University of Iowa officials their jobs.

We can only sit back and wait for jurors' decision - wait to learn, even, what they will be called upon to decide.

If you've been following the coverage, you know Judge Paul Miller is giving serious consideration to the defense's motion to drop the second degree sexual abuse charge after hearing Everson's one-time co-defendant, Abe Satterfield, give lackluster testimony.

I was in the courtroom to hear it, but just about the only thing I learned was this: That former Hawkeye apparently is one sound sleeper.

It was frustrating to hear Prosecutor Anne Lahey try to get her own witness - the one who slipped a possible prison term in return for his testimony - to give up any detail about what happened in Room N207.

All he knows, he testified, is he and the woman were sleeping in a bed in that vacant dorm room when Everson tapped him on the shoulder. “He told me to get out of the bed,” Satterfield said. “I got out of the bed and went to sleep on the floor.”

He didn't wonder why? Nope. Didn't hear anything? Nope. Didn't wonder why Everson, as he tells it, tapped him again and told him to get back in the bed? “I was sleeping, you know,” he testified. “And when you're sleeping, you don't really analyze stuff.”

Or when you're awake, I guess. But, like I said, it's the jury's job to decide the facts of Everson's case, not mine.

In the meantime, here are some other interesting facts. According to experts:

College-aged women are at greater risk of being sexually assaulted than at any other time in their lives. Eighty-two percent of sexual assaults occur before the victim reaches age 25. Eight times out of 10, victims are sexually assaulted by someone they know. Only one in five will report the assault to police.

And although sexual assault is falsely reported at the same rate as every other crime - about

2 percent - the trials always end up being different, somehow.

Something to reflect on - to analyze, to borrow a term - while the jury is out.

Comments: (319) 339-3154; jennifer.hemmingsen@sourcemedia.net