Ashley Wagner Opens up about Her Sexual Assault: Find out the Details of Her Experiences

Three-time U.S. national victor figure skater and 2014 Olympic bronze medalist Ashley Wagner wrote in USA Today on Thursday that she was explicitly struck by the late skater John Coughlin when she was 17 and he was 22. 

Wagner, in the original individual article, composes that when she was going to a figure skating camp in Colorado in 2008, she went to a local gathering tossed by "a portion of the neighborhood competitors." 

She depicts this is another experience, and the first occasion when she, at any point, had anything to drink. Wagner wound up going through the night at the house after no one could drive her back to her lodging. This is when Coughlin, who had contended in the U.S. Figure Skating Championships now in his life, moved into her bed and groped her.  She said: 

"It was the middle of the night. I felt him creep into my bed. I had been resting and didn't move since I didn't comprehend what it implied. I thought he needed a spot to relax. At that point, he began kissing my neck. I claimed to be profound snoozing, trusting he would stop. He didn't. At the point when his hands began to meander when he started touching me, grabbing my body. I attempted to move around with the goal that he would think I was awakening and would stop. He didn't. 

I, at that point, felt myself beginning to cry, and I realized I needed to settle on a decision. I opened my eyes and pulled away from him as he kissed my neck. I got his attacking hand, and I instructed him to stop. Furthermore, he did. He took a gander at me for a couple of moments, discreetly got up and left the room. The majority of this occurred over the time of around five minutes. That is such a modest quantity of time. However, it's spooky me from that point onward. "

Toward the beginning of the next day, Wagner composes, Coughlin acted as nothing occurred. Thus she did as well. She enlightened two individuals near her regarding the attack, however generally held her head down. Wagner says not just had she not been educated about consent at that age, yet she was additionally stressed over potential ramifications for her very own career. 

"I was a youthful skater coming up through the positions in a deciding game. I would not like to mix the pot. I would not like to add anything to my vocation that would make me appear to be unwanted or emotional. I would not like to be referred to in figure skating as the competitor who might raise a ruckus. What's more, I truly didn't feel like anybody would hear me out in any case. Everybody truly loved this person. I even loved him."

John Coughlin

Coughlin's history of sexual offense didn't wind up open until January 2019. He had been set on between time suspension as a result of three objections against him and died by suicide later. The first of Coughlin's exploited people to open up to the world was his previous skating accomplice Bridget Namiotka, who composed that he maltreated her for a long time. At the point when the two began skating together, Namiotka was 14 and Coughlin was 19. 

Wagner proceeded to vie for one more decade after the strike, winning an Olympic award in the group occasion in 2014 and a silver decoration as a singles skater at the World Championships in 2016. She composes that she chose it was necessary to disclose to her story because, in figure skating, it's typical for youthful female contenders to travel and associate with grown-up male contenders. 

Changes should be made to keep those youthful skaters sheltered and shielded from what SafeSport has called "a culture in figure skating that enabled preparing and maltreatment to go unchecked for a long time." 

"This year I viewed a sensational youthful hotshot, Alysa Liu, become the U.S. figure skating national hero at 13," she composed. "It was at that time that I understood that I needed to approach my story." 

Barbara Reichert, a representative for USFS, disclosed to USA Today in an explanation that "what happened to Ashley ought not to transpire, period. Ashley is staggeringly solid; not simply to have the fearlessness to approach with her story, however, to share her experience openly to help other people. Ashley as of late talked at U.S. Figure Skating competitor security classes and her experience and message of strengthening profoundly affected skaters and their folks." 

Wagner composed that her family's military foundation instructed her to put her head down despite misfortune. She additionally expected that her parents would be frantic she went to a party. 

"In 2008, I didn't have the information and strengthening that that accompanied the #MeToo Movement," Wagner composed. "Nobody had disclosed consent to me." 

As a youthful skater who was all the while building up herself, Wagner would not like to cause herself to appear "unfortunate or emotional." "What's more, I didn't feel like anybody would hear me out anyway," Wagner said. 

Watching youthful skaters like 13-year-old Alysa Liu, she knew she expected to share her story to make the game safe for young competitors in a little social pool made up of adolescents and grown-ups. 

She said she additionally went to US Figure Skating and proposed changes to competitor instruction and health. "This is a weight cooker condition that will keep on being awkward, unseemly and hazardous workplaces except if something is done about it," Wagner composed. 

Wagner is the most brightened U.S. female skater of her time as a three-time national hero and champ of a group bronze award at the 2014 Winter Olympics. 

Wagner, 28, is the most noteworthy profile skater to make an open claim of rape in her game and is the second top skater to blame Coughlin freely, a double-cross U.S. sets champion who kicked the bucket by suicide Jan. 18, the day after the U.S. Place for SafeSport gave him a break suspension. In May, Bridget Namiotka, his sets partner from 2004-07, blamed Coughlin for explicitly mishandling her for a long time when she was between the ages of 14 and 17, and he was 18-21.