Pieper Lewis said she was repeatedly raped by Zachary Brooks, 37, when she was just 15. On one occasion, in June 2020, he grabbed a knife from a nightstand in his Des Moines apartment and stabbed Brooks more than 30 times in a fit of rage. She pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and wounding in the case last year. Both charges are punishable by up to 10 years in prison. Lewis was sentenced in an Iowa court on Tuesday to five years of strict supervision and ordered to pay $150,000 in restitution to Brooks’ family. District Judge David Porter addressed the controversial demand that Lewis be forced to make payments to the family of her alleged rapist. But he said the court “had no choice,” noting that restitution is mandatory under Iowa law. Lewis, now 17, said in a statement: “My spirit has been burned, but it still shines through the flames. Hear me roar, see me shine, and see me grow.” Iowa officials said Lewis was a teenage runaway trying to escape a bad life with her adopted mother and was sleeping in the hallways of a Des Moines apartment building. A 28-year-old man took her in before forcibly trafficking her to other men for sex. Lewis said he was forced at knifepoint by the 28-year-old trafficker to accompany Brooks to his apartment for sex. She told officials that after Brooks raped her again, she grabbed a knife from a nightstand and stabbed him. The teenager admitted she had committed a crime but defended her actions, saying she felt she “was in danger”. “My intentions that day were not just to go out and take someone’s life,” he said. Police and prosecutors have not disputed that Lewis was sexually assaulted and trafficked. But prosecutors argued that Brooks was asleep at the time of the stabbing, and therefore did not pose an immediate threat. Iowa has an affirmative defense law that gives some leeway to defendants who committed a crime “under duress by the threat of serious injury to another.” But prosecutors argued at her sentencing that Lewis waived that right when she pleaded guilty to manslaughter and wounding. Under the terms of her probation, Judge Porter ordered Lewis placed in a residential facility where she must wear a monitoring device. She could be sentenced to 20 years in prison if she violates the terms of her five-year sentence. “This is the second chance you asked for. You don’t get a third,” the judge said.
