In 2014, famous Viner at the time Curtis Lepore was accused of rape by his ex-girlfriend Jessi Smiles, who was also well-known on Vine. To put it simple, the situation was, Jessi had a concussion while filming one of her Vines. Curtis came to her help, but then allegedly raped her while she was asleep.
He was arrested in October of 2013 for the rape charge but very quickly earned bail with only a $100,000 payment. On February 21st of 2014, he pleaded guilty to Felony Assault, basically dismissing the rape charge.
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Both stars took to Twitter to discuss what they could about the case. Curtis was repulsive, while Jessi was heartbroken. Curtis tweeted egocentric and degrading things that should have blown up in his face in his case.
He's celebrating, and yelling "Woo-Hoo!" to the whole world.
He refers to the case as a "good story" and wants to give us a cliffhanger on his assault on Jessi.
Here's where we can see Curtis's blatantly obvious degrading thoughts against women. He needs to be reminded that even when a girl dumps you, and chooses a career or money over you, that doesn't give you an excuse to physically assault her.
The same day, he tweeted "Who would willingly have sex with me?" and then deleted it. Probably realized that this means nothing, and makes him look like a narcissistic asshole who thinks of women as sex objects and only that.
And here, he clearly states that only cares about his fame remaining. Also, referring to a women being assaulted by YOU as a "setback" is extremely demeaning and belittling to all women, especially those who are unfortunately rape victims.
One would think that after the charge, and the horrible, vain tweets, most of his fans would turn around and not support him. Especially since his fan base is mostly young girls. Surprisingly, his fan base was extremely supportive of Curtis. While being blindingly supportive of Curtis, his fan base was also extremely cruel to Jessi, calling her an "attention whore," slandering her left and right, even sending her death threats.
Jessi did have support from her fan base though, which she clearly was thankful for.
Curtis actually had far more support than Jessi did and never received a fraction of the harmful messages she did. Still, HE was the one to act immature. Jessi just wanted this to be settled and was thankful for the support she did receive.
This case, in my opinion, proved that rape culture exists and still does. Curtis Lepore is still famous, now with nearly 10 million followers on Vine. He also recently started a YouTube Channel which was an immediate hit, and his videos are always some of the most sacred on Facebook. And out of curiosity, I always check the comments to see if anyone comments on the case, but there are never any at all.
Honestly, unless you kept of with both stars at the time of the charge, you probably didn't hear about this at all. Neatly every one I talk to had no clue of it ever happening. It flew under the radar when it most definitely should not have. No, we will never truly know what actually happened, we will never get the full, honest story. Nonetheless, how much this story went unknown and the amount of slander Jessi received, and still does, speaks volumes on rape culture. This is one of countless rape charges that got shoved under the rug and never looked at again. There needs to be something done.
