He was a sports hero, who took Michigan State to the NCAA Championship in 2000, which means he falls right into the category of men inclined to rape according to the current “survivor” narrative. Yet, he was acquitted.

A jury of nine women and three men began deliberating his case at 1:45 p.m. and reached a verdict in about 2½ hours.

It’s not the quickest verdict ever, but 2½ hours to acquittal is pretty fast. It wasn’t for lack of effort on the prosecution’s part. They did what they could to prove their case.

 In September 2015, Cleaves forced himself on a drunken woman who ran from a motel room wearing only a bra in an attempt to flee him, they argued. Drunk and naked himself, they say, Cleaves pulled her back inside, twice, and raped her.

Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor David Champine told jurors that Cleaves’ lawyer would try to argue the sex was consensual but the evidence would show otherwise. He urged them to “look at the surveillance video of the woman running away, screaming ‘help me, help me, help me’ and then being forced back into the room.”

They had video. The jury saw the video. The defendant and his lawyer, Mike Manley, knew there was video and what the video showed. Still, they went to trial.

Mike Manley said in his closing argument that the sex was consensual, noting that the woman posed for pictures with Cleaves, put his phone number into her phone, went to a motel room with him, where she acknowledged kissing him.

When the woman left the room wearing only her bra, Cleaves was doing the right thing by bringing her back so she could get dressed, Manley said.

“All you saw there was a gentleman going out to make sure that a lady wasn’t walking around a motel naked,” he said.

After seeing the video, hearing the testimony and argument by prosecution and defense, the jury got the case. It only took the nine women and three men 2½ hours to acquit. And afterward, all hell broke loose.

The surveillance video, which was played in court but not allowed to be broadcast while the trial was ongoing, was taken outside of the Knights Inn Motel in Grand Blanc. The struggle, prosecutors say, took place between 1:30AM and 2:00AM. It was released today by the Wayne County Prosecutor’s office through a public records request.

Once the video was released into the wild, a swell of outrage at the verdict grew from those who, for the first time, saw the video and believed, with certainty, that it proved Cleaves was guilty.

In response to the released video, Manley stated:

The video was presented in a Court of Law. A Jury found Mr. Cleaves Not Guilty of all charges,” Manley wrote. “The complainant had her day in Court. The criminal matter is closed. Not Guilty remains Not Guilty.

Having tried the case once in court, with the video before the jury along with all other evidence, Manley wasn’t about to try it again in the media. Cleaves was found not guilty. Case closed. Except the case isn’t closed at all as far as many in the public who, now that they get to see one part of the evidence, are certain that Cleaves is guilty.

As one of the least outraged people on twitter offered,

I imagine the people who were in my mentions saying “Mateen Cleaves was the true victim” in his rape case didn’t see this video. Or hell, maybe they have. Nothing surprises me at this point.

Others were less kind.

I hope Cleaves gets run over by a garbage truck after watching that. And then backed over again. Twice.

There is no question that the video is a disturbing piece of evidence. Even though it was known that there was video, and the content of the video was described in the media during trial, seeing the actual video has an impact of an entirely different magnitude. They may have known it before, but now that people outside the trial have seen it, they are certain of Cleaves’ guilt.

But the defense saw it before making the decision to take the case to trial, and yet they did. The jury saw it, but they also heard the rest of the evidence and the argument of counsel, and acquitted. Now that the video has been publicly revealed, none of this matters. Or worse, this proves the worst conspiracy theories about how many can get away with rape, especially sports heroes. What could those nine women on the jury have been thinking to acquit Cleaves?

By releasing the video after trial, Cleaves, and to some extent Manley, are placed in an untenable situation. They faced this video once in a courtroom, before a jury, with a prosecutor demanding a conviction, and yet he was found not guilty. The people watching the video afterward consider none of this; they only see what they see, and they reach their own verdict.

Is Cleaves supposed to argue his case again? Is he supposed to explain why that video doesn’t prove what people believe with certainty it proves? Is there any chance that they would listen, deliberate, consider what Cleaves has to say? Not likely. Hell, not a chance in the world.

People will argue that the video shows what it shows, and they saw it with their own eyes, and there is no additional testimony, no argumentation, that’s going to change what they saw. And what they saw screams that Mateen Cleaves is guilty.

While Cleaves won’t be going to prison, as he has been “technically” acquitted of all four counts, he will be facing a life where people are not only certain of his guilty, but can point to the evidence to prove it. Beyond pointing out that he was already put through the gauntlet in a courtroom and came out the other end acquitted, there isn’t much to be done or said to save Cleaves at this point. But for video, he was acquitted. Now, he will be guilty in perpetuity with no appeal.