MISSION, Kan. — A Kansas woman who alleges consensual sex with a friend in his college dorm room turned into a terrifying sexual assault took matters into her own hands when prosecutors declined to file a rape charge.
She called a citizen grand jury, relying on a 134-year-old state law. Twenty-two-year-old Madison Smith collected hundreds of signatures to call the grand jury to bring more serious charges against Jared Stolzenburg, her classmate at Bethany College in Lindsborg. He had pleaded guilty to aggravated battery and received two years’ probation. Kansas is one of six states that allow citizens to petition for grand juries.
The 1887 law was rarely used until anti-abortion activists began using it to investigate abortion clinics.
