Is this a sick joke? They’ve just announced the nominees for the 2017 Pro Football Hall of Fame. The list of 94 players includes Darren Sharper, the 5-time Pro Bowl safety. He’s also a serial rapist, currently serving a 20-year sentence for his hideous crimes.
This is the second year in a row for Sharper. It seems the voters had enough decency not to let him in last year.
Then, it was widely reported that “character” is not a requirement for entry. So that means someone found guilty of drugging and raping women would be okay.
But there are some requirements.
According to the Hall of Fame, he must have been retired for five years before he can be considered and even fans can nominate him by contacting them.
We’ll learn his fate in February of 2017 if he gets in. But even if he does make it, I don’t think a serial rapist would be allowed a furlough for the ceremony.
Last year, I wrote the following piece for a defunct sports site. I thought it would be a good idea to share my thoughts from then, especially since they haven’t changed.
Darren Sharper: The All-Pro Serial Rapist
Darren Sharper. A fourteen-year veteran of the NFL. A five-time Pro Bowler. A Super Bowl winner with the New Orleans Saints. An NFL Network analyst. A serial rapist and sexual predator.
On March 23, 2015, he pleaded no contest in a Los Angeles courtroom to drugging and raping two women he met in a West Hollywood bar. No contest is basically the same as guilty. At least, it is to me.
On March 24th, Sharper pleaded guilty of drugging and raping two women before an Arizona court. This was done via an internet hookup from Los Angeles. In an unusual move, he was immediately sentenced.
Also on March 24th, he pleaded guilty in a Las Vegas courtroom to a reduced felony attempted sex assault charge. This was also via an Internet hook-up from Los Angeles.
Currently, he’s in St. Tammany Parish (Louisiana) jail awaiting his appearance in a New Orleans courtroom on charges of drugging and raping three women. In these cases, Sharper’s alleged accomplices were Erik Nunez and Brandon Licciardi, a former Sergeant with the St. Bernard Parish Sherriff’s Office.
All of these plea deals are part of a four-state package to help Sharper avoid serving a ton of years in prison. In California alone, he escaped 33 years. Instead, he’ll probably serve no more than nine years.
Too many of us—especially men—still believe rape is about sex. Okay. If rape is truly about sex, how do we explain Darren Sharper? He’s famous and has made millions of dollars in his 14-year NFL career. He could have more women in a month than most men could ever dream of having in a lifetime.
However, since Sharper wanted these particular women, he decided to simply take them. He’d drop a little Zolpidem into their drinks and had his way with them. Since they were drugged, they could do nothing to stop him. That’s power, isn’t it?
In the interest of disclosure, this is personal with me. During my life, I’ve met and/or have been in relationships with quite a number of women who’ve survived rape and abuse. I felt like I attracted them as if I were a magnet. Finally, one such woman gave me an explanation:
“…you might make them feel safe or comfortable about talking and confiding in you…”
However, these women have been hurt by so many men like Sharper who’ve treated them as sexual playthings, only to be tossed aside afterward. I’ve sat with them as they’ve told me their stories of pain and suffering. You see, it doesn’t end with the rape. It lasts a lifetime. And therapy and treatment often cannot erase it.
I’ve also cried with them as they’ve spoken of the ongoing trauma they suffer because of it. They feel dirty…tainted…worthless. They also often feel guilty. As if they were accomplices of the inhuman beings who mistreated them. And it’s not helped by our legal system. It victimizes them again during the process of seeking justice. Justice not for them, but for the perpetrators. Yes, I understand you’re innocent until proven guilty and we can never forget that. But why do we need to so quickly label the rape survivor as guilty based on the details of her past or how she’s dressed?
Enter Sharper’s plea deal. Sadly, such deals like these are the easiest way to clean the trash off the streets and it also protects the rape survivors from being raped once again, this time on the witness stand for everyone to see as their attackers walk free.
So, Darren Sharper—the serial rapist and sexual predator—may serve no more than nine years for drugging and raping/sexually assaulting nine women in four states. I hope Sharper’s case finally puts to rest the notion that rape is about sex. It’s not. The sexual act is only the power tool used in the exercise of the violent act of rape.
However, Sharper may soon become a victim of this act himself. The last I heard, rapists aren’t high on the prison food chain. On the contrary, they’re at the bottom, along with child molesters. So, based on prison justice, he may soon understand how it feels to be raped. He’ll become the sexual plaything to be used and abused by his fellow inmates who will value him even less than he valued his victims.
Of course, he won’t have the benefit of Zolpidem. He’ll be able to remember every inch of his experience.
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Lawrence is an author and contributor to the best-selling Chicken Soup for the Soul book series. He’s also a member of Toastmasters International. He’s lived in interesting places, including over 6 years in Germany. Click here to read more from him at The Huffington Post, or visit LawrenceElliott.com.