There’s no treatment harsh enough for Wanetta Gibson
Hardly a week goes by when I don’t receive a nasty and haughty message attacking me for harshly judging the unethical conduct of another. “Who are you to judge?,” the critic will write. “Are you so perfect? Have you never made a mistake? How can you know what was going on in that person’s life, or how bad she (or he) feels? What right do you have to find fault with someone else?” My answer, if I bother to send one, seldom varies. I tell these correspondents that all of us have a duty to judge others so that we are qualified to judge ourselves, to make certain that societal standards are carefully considered and vetted, and to identify conduct that we believe is destructive to society. Refusing to judge others makes it easy for the predators around us to take advantage of our ethical laziness, and people get hurt as a result.
And in those dark moments late at night, after a difficult day when my confidence is at low ebb, as I begin to doubt the purpose of my life and question my own values, I think about people like the horrible Wanetta Gibson.
From the New York Daily News:
“The kidnap-rape conviction of a once-promising prep football star was dismissed Thursday following a recantation by his accuser. Brian Banks collapsed in sobs on the counsel table during a court hearing where a prosecutor quickly conceded the decade-old case and moved for the dismissal.
“In the summer of 2002, Banks’ future looked bright: He was a 17-year-old high school football star being heavily recruited by a number of colleges. But in a single day that changed with the accusations of kidnapping and rape by a female student. He maintained there was no rape and their sexual contact was consensual, but his lawyer urged him to plead no contest rather than risk a sentence of 41 years to life in prison if convicted. He followed the advice and went to prison for six years, shattering his dreams of gridiron glory.”
Then, we learn, the former student, Wanetta Gibson, contacted Banks on Facebook after his release. They met, and she confessed that she had lied to prosecutors about the rape, that as he knew, she had consented. But she told him that she didn’t want to confess to prosecutors, because she didn’t want to have to return the $1.5 million damages award her mother obtained from Long Beach Polytechnic High based on her lies and Banks’ conviction. It took the dedication of the California Innocence Project to get the truth to court and exonerate Banks, who has had to wear a monitoring device while he was on probation and register as a sex offender.
There are not sufficient laws, nor words in the dictionary, nor public shaming, shunning and condemnation to do justice to the likes of Wanetta Gibson. She ruined a young man’s life and stole $1.5 million in the process. She can recant, apologize, say that she found God, weep, express regret and anything else, and it should not insulate her from societal rejection. No one should hire her. No bank should give her a loan or a credit card. No taxpayer should have to contribute to her health insurance or food stamps. No one should befriend her. Absolutely no one should forgive her, consort with her or trust her. The kind of organized hatred that was manufactured against George Zimmerman is appropriate in her case. The Golden Rule? If I behaved like Wanetta Gibson, I would deserve everything I have described, and more.
There is no law that can place her in prison long enough; the Constitution prevents us from indenturing her to Brian Banks for life; we don’t allow torture or tar and feathering. She can change her name and identity, and still lurk among decent people, until another impulse provokes her to ruin someone else’s life. We require convicted sex offenders to register, and they post photographs of these people, many if not most of them harmless and law abiding citizens. Why isn’t there a Terrible Human Being registry for Wanetta Gibson? Even if hers were the only name on it, it would be worth having.
When she has given all of her earthly possessions to Brian Banks, and paid back all of the money she fraudulently took from the schools that could have used it to serve its students’ needs, and dedicated her life to charity, the poor, sick and dispossessed, maybe then we should consider whether she deserves a nod when we pass her on the street, rather than a sneer. Maybe. But even then she will not have erased to consequences of her intentional, malicious, anti-social act to destroy a young man’s future for her own selfish gain.
What can we do with people like her? How can we protect ourselves from them? We can begin by judging them, condemning them, stating loudly and firmly how terrible and unforgivable their conduct has been, and never, ever, trusting them. It is not enough, not by a long shot. But it’s a start.
__________________________________________
Pointer: Legal Ethics Forum
Facts: New York Daily News
Ethics Alarms attempts to give proper attribution and credit to all sources of facts, analysis and other assistance that go into its blog posts. If you are aware of one I missed, or believe your own work was used in any way without proper attribution, please contact me, Jack Marshall, at jamproethics@verizon.net.
Ethics Alarms 
I hope at the very least, Long Beach Poly HS sues the pants off them.
Either lock her away for life or execute her.
The laws don’t permit either.
She deserves to be prosecuted and to return the blood money. What a despicable b**ch. I heard she has 2 children. God have mercy on their souls.
Thanks for visiting Ethics Alarms, Rita. I loved you in “Gilda”!
You left one group out that was also harmed by her actions. Any women in the future who are actually kidnaped and raped my now not be believed because of this witch .
Absolutely right.
As a USC graduate, a woman, a soon to be attorney that has written on behalf of inmates for the innocence project, I couldn’t have said it better myself. I must say I am impressed and in awe of how Banks has responded to the aftermath of his release. I truly hope justice is served in this case and that 1) some NFL team takes a chance on Banks and 2) Gibson gets what she deserves.
I listened to an interview with Banks this evening, also. He sounds like an incredible human being. Not bitter, but also not forgiving and forgetting. Here’s hoping he can move on and not let this define the rest of his life.
Hi, i just got wanettagibson.com. Im not trying to sell it, but i dont want her to have it, as she is truely a horrible person. Let me know if anyone wants it.
Quick thinking! Bravo!
Have it redirect to this posting or the original article.
What a despicable piece of trash that woman is. I feel sorry for her two children, being raised by such horrible human being.
There is absolutely no amount that woman could ever do to be enough to replace what she took from Brian Banks.
USC should give him a scholarship to play football. That would be much more likely to help him get his life back together. Getting a good education would be much better then just trying to make a NFL team without any college experience.
I couldn’t have said it better myself. What a vile excuse for a human being. I hope every moment of every day of the rest of her wretched life is as miserable as she is.
There are people making lists of false rape accusers on the net. I am always dismayed when the man’s name is released in these cases and the woman’s is not. It’s often years later when the woman’s name is publicized.
I hate that policy, always have. It is doubly sexist, and archaic. If a woman is going to accuse a man of something that will destroy his reputation, she had better be willing to have her name exposed as well.
I don’t believe that any law prevents the publication of the name of an alleged rape victim. That’s what I was taught in journalism school 20 years ago. It is a voluntary policy of news media. I agree with you, Jack.
With all my respect to everyone I would like something to be said about how the US law is soo overly sensitive and harsh about sex issues, which in my opinion offered great help to criminal people like Wanetta Gibson to conduct their poisoned evil !!
Some will say, well that’s for the high rate of sex crime in the US. This is true but again why and what to do about it ? I lived for a while in Europe and I saw – as it’s very well known I guess – how people there enjoy much more sexual freedom than here where sex is not a taboo , dating is much more natural , interracial dating and marriage is common and regardless of your moral stand the legal prostitution is helping a lot . just take a look around the internet and watch how many comments and even blogs about how hard it is for single men in America – and eventually for women by default – to live healthy intimate and sexual life and how the human mating scene in the US is deformed , specially if you are a minority. I am not an ethicist judging things or preaching solutions here, but I think maybe we should look for different angles to help the society that is suffering eather from rape and/or sexual deprivation.
Don’t stop there! What “different angles”? Give me at least one to think about, because I can’t conceive of one on my own.
Plus, the retractions on all the news networks should be as visible as were the initial accusations. Tabloid TV buries it’s mistakes, it doesn’t spend nearly the effort as it does smearing people for quick ratings.
Where did the ‘You don’t know what’s going on in her life’ excuse come from? I hate it with a passion…
I don’t know, but I get that one regularly. I’ll see your hate, and raise you a nausea…
I don’t believe in good and bad people. I simply believe in people who do both good and bad things. She did something TERRIBLE. I’m glad at some point she had the decency to tell the truth. Now she should be charged with fraud and defamation of character to the furthest extent of the law.
There are definitely bad human beings, A, lots of them, and she is one. She never told the truth to anyone but her victim…she wanted to still hold on to her stolen damages. He got lawyers to expose her in court. She deserves no credit, quarter, sympathy, empathy or mercy at all. And she is bad to the bone. Bad people are called sociopaths, and they have no consciences. That’s her.
She is a horrible woman. Our legal system must prosecute her!!!
Give it a few weeks and there will be reports of how badly she is being treated, how she is depressed and suicidal (probably all made up) and she will turn into the “victim” again. This is the world we live in. When you get yourself into trouble with lies, you lie to get back out of trouble rather than accepting the consequences and try to make things right.
It makes me sick to my stomach KNOWING she will never be punished or face consequences.
Suicidal? she should do us all a favor…actually, scratch that, that’s the easy way out..
Found a recent article that has pictures of her, http://blacksportsonline.com/home/2012/05/photos-wanetta-gibson-who-falsely-accused-hs-star-brian-banks-of-rape-destroy-his-life/
I’m almost angry at Banks for being so cool and collect about, sometimes you need to get angry, get inspired.
Just keep in mind she was a minor when she first accused him and lord knows the role her parents have played in this. I am not saying she doesn’t deserve harsh judgement just please keep in mind she was a minor when it happened and that her parents should be the ones who deserve your hatred as much as her.
Are you kidding me? DH was wrong. It did not take a few weeks for her to turn to a “victim” Grady is starting now by suggesting her parents are to blame. That is the problem with this society. No one is at fault it is someone else at fault (I think it was the insurance company that started this with “no fault” insurance :)). She is the one to blame for all of this and she should be put away.
He was also a minor when he was thrown in jail for 6 years.
She had years to retract her story. She was a minor for one year, after the accusation? A 17-year-old knows that they’re doing something wrong.
It could only be worse if the person she did it to was her own father. Oh, wait… that’s already happened.
The police and prosecutors who pushed this flimsy case share culpability with Wanetta Gibson. Her story never passed the “sniff test”. If they had had any integrity, they would not have ignored Gibson’s blatant lying.
I don’t know why so many are searching for others to blame. Rape is always a matter of who the jury believes, and the system is increasingly slanted now to resume the male’s guilt. If she didn’t have a history of lying or promiscuity, the police had to bring charges. SHE lied, nobody else. Everybody else was trying to do the right thing.
AMEN!
A rape trial must be among the most difficult for a jury to decide because of the difficulty in knowing who is telling the truth with it being a matter of ‘he says, she says’, the jury not wanting to convict an innocent man nor wanting to let a rapist go free. It may be especially difficult if either the defendant or the victim is an accomplished liar. This is why I never wanted to serve on a jury of a rape trial.
So I was lucky four years ago when serving at a rape trial, that when the girl told her story to the court it just did not ring true, so a not guilty verdict was easy to reach.