Police investigating Brock Turner, the former Stanford swimmer convicted of sexual assault, looked into evidence that the 19-year-old student photographed his victim's breasts the night he sexually assaulted her, according to a report by The Daily Mail.
Citing court documents, the Mail writes that Turner received a message on his phone shortly after his arrest on Jan. 18, 2015 that read, "WHOS TIT IS THAT." The message, which came from a member of Turner's swim team who was using the messaging app GroupMe, was referring to a photo that had already been deleted.
The timing raised investigators' suspicions. Documents show they obtained a search warrant for Turner's phone, but the crime lab was never able to retrieve the deleted photo because of the way the third-party messaging app functions.
To make things look even worse for Turner, one of the graduate students who found him assaulting the woman behind a dumpster that night told police that Turner was "standing over her with a cell phone" and that the cell phone "had a bright light pointed in the direction of the female," according to the police report published by the Mail.
While the newly-revealed police details don't prove definitively that Turner photographed his victim that night, it's another disturbing detail in an already very disturbing case.
Turner was facing a maximum of sentence of 14 years in the case but was sentenced to a highly controversial six months in jail last month. The case started getting renewed attention after a letter Turner's father read in his son's defense at his sentencing started going viral, along with an emotional letter written by his victim.
Several swim team members sent reference letters to judge Aaron Persky to try to lessen the severity of Turner's punishment. Justin Buck, the student who sent the "WHOSE TIT IS THAT" message, was not one of them.
The Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office, Buck, and Alaleh Kianerci—the prosecutor who put together the court document—did not immediately return Complex's request for comment.
