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Logan Square Gropings Leave Women Angry, Traumatized: 'How Depressing'

By Mina Bloom | October 21, 2016 5:58am | Updated on October 21, 2016 10:34am
 Women in Logan Square have reported a series of gropings in the neighborhood recently.
Women in Logan Square have reported a series of gropings in the neighborhood recently.
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LOGAN SQUARE — A woman who was groped while walking in Logan Square earlier this month is just one of many victims of assault in the neighborhood over the last six months, other victims say.

Jane Beachy said she was groped Tuesday evening.

Around 6:30 p.m., Beachy was walking near St. Louis and Belden avenues while talking on the phone when a boy riding a bike — who Beachy guessed was no older than 15 — grabbed her breasts. 

Stunned, she shouted at the boy, and he rode away laughing, she said.

"The thing that makes it difficult is less the actual action," Beachy said. "It's more, here I am having a nice day, minding my own business, and all of a sudden I'm forced to really viscerally reckon with the scope of assault and trauma happening all over. It makes me harken back to more traumatic things that have happened in my life."

Beachy said she didn't file a police report because she was torn between "wanting to take care of a young person and wanting to [reprimand] him."

But she said she wishes she had been able to take a photo of the boy.

"I think the threat of humiliation is the only powerful tool that we have in moments like that," she said.

Months earlier, in July, Kathleen Oshinski was walking to work near Milwaukee and Fullerton avenues when a man cycling the opposite way grabbed her breasts. 

"I felt really angry. I just had no voice in the matter. My agency had been taken away," she said. 

What frustrated Oshinski more than the groping itself, she said, was that a few men who witnessed the assault just stood there laughing.

Like Beachy, Oshinski, 26, didn't file a police report. 

"That didn't even cross my mind that they would've taken any interest in that. How depressing," she said. 

Earlier this month, Leticia, who declined to provide her last name, was walking in the 2600 block of West Altgeld Street when an unknown man groped her butt. Leticia told DNAinfo it wasn't the first time she had been groped in the neighborhood.

Beachy and Oshinski said they weren't surprised to hear about similar incidents happening in Logan Square.

"The only thing that could surprise me is if there's one woman in the entire world who could claim something like this has never happened to her," said Beachy, adding that the few Logan Square incidents are just "the tip of the iceberg."

The women said speaking out about sexual assault is more urgent now in light of allegations against Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump. 

"Frankly, the ugliness of Donald Trump and [the scandals] is bringing a lot of unseemly conversations to the forefront, conversations that are uncomfortable," Beachy said. 

Oshinski agreed, saying the political climate is sparking more conversations.

"People are starting to articulate these frustrations, and there's more space in general for women to vocalize it," she said. "I don't feel as embarrassed as I might've [been in the past]. No, I wasn't hurt; this assault didn't leave me injured, but that doesn't mean I can't be upset about it."

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