UNITED STATES
Yahoo Sports
August 1, 2019
By Liz Roscher
Figure skater Ashley Wagner wrote a powerful first-person essay that appeared on USA Today on Thursday, bravely recounting her sexual assault. In the essay, she says that the man who assaulted her was now-deceased figure skater John Coughlin.
Wagner says that the assault happened in June of 2008, when she had just turned 17. She went to her first party while she was at a figure skating camp in Colorado Springs, a house party thrown by several local athletes. She and her friends were offered beds in the house when they couldn’t find rides back to their hotel at the end of the night, and Wagner said that she felt “safe” because she was with her friends.
In the middle of the night, Wagner wrote that she woke up when Coughlin, who was 22 at the time, came into the room and got into bed with her. She said that he started kissing her neck and touching her, and pretending to be asleep didn’t make him stop.
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