Attacked Winnipeg teen Rinelle Harper called a hero and fighter

The father of Rinelle Harper, the 16-year-old girl who was sexually assaulted and left unconscious near Winnipeg's Assiniboine River, tried to speak to media but could say few words between sobs.

"Our life is really tough time," the soft-spoken Caesar Harper said Thursday with his head hung down.

He managed to say "thank you so much" to the public for support and prayers before backing away from the microphones.

It was the first time Rinelle's parents have addressed the media since their daughter was attacked on Saturday.

Julie Harper, Rinelle's mother, couldn't speak initially, but then asked for the microphone, saying about her daughter, "She's a fighter, she's a hero to everyone."

When Caesar Harper was asked what Rinelle said when he first saw her in the hospital, he said she wasn't awake.

Then he choked back more sobs and said, "I didn't know what was going to happen to her. She looked so bad, so beaten.

"It's really hard to forget what I saw [but] I'm so glad she's going to be alive."

He added Rinelle "doesn't remember anything that happened to her."

The family, along with some aboriginal leaders, held the news conference in the Winnipeg boardroom for Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO), an organization representing most First Nations in the province's north.

Rinelle is from Garden Hill First Nation in northern Manitoba, but has been living in Winnipeg while attending Southeast Collegiate, a high school for aboriginal students that is owned and operated by nine northern Manitoba First Nations.

No retaliation

"We see the assault on Rinelle as an assault on all of us," said Greg Harper, chief of Red Sucker First Nation, who attended the news conference as part of MKO.

MKO Grand Chief David Harper said there is a lot of emotion following the attack, both sadness and rage, but he urged people not to retaliate against anyone.

"One family's hurt enough. There are two other families that are hurt already," he said, referring to the arrests of two people in connection to the attack on Rinelle.

Winnipeg police announced Wednesday that two people — Justin Hudson, 20, and a 17-year-old male — have been charged with attempted murder, aggravated sexual assault and sexual assault with a weapon.

Some messages on social media have called for violence against the two accused.

"Please, I plead the people out there on social media, we have to, as chiefs and as others, we have to turn this around," David Harper said. "Today, moving forward as family and as a community, we ask that this is a time the wind has to change. It is in each and every one of us, our responsibility to make that change. We have to put an end to violence."

He also called on Winnipeg's new mayor, Brian Bowman, to open the doors to city hall to hear the concerns of First Nations people.

"For us First Nations to be able to go talk to him and say look, these are the things we need to change, because almost every First Nation community brings its economy to the city of Winnipeg — our children are here, our kids go to school here, there's a lot of concerns we go through," he said.

Wants to go back to school

In one of the moments where she managed a smile, Julie Harper said her daughter is already talking about going back to school, even though she was just moved from the hospital intensive care unit to the children's ward on Wednesday.

​"She's already eager to go back to Southeast Collegiate. She wants to go back this week," Harper said.

Also on Wednesday, students returned to Southeast Collegiate for the first time after the Remembrance Day long weekend. The atmosphere was a sombre one, with lots of counselling taking place, according to school officials.

The school said it's working with the RCMP to do more street-proofing of the students when they come from reserves.

Rinelle lives in residence along with other students, but she was signed out to her parents' care on the night of the attack. The friends she was with that night had been signed out of residence too.

Attacked under bridge

Police said Rinelle was out with friends in Winnipeg's South Broadway area when she became separated from the group.

Two males struck up a conversation with her, and the three of them went for a walk. Once under the Midtown Bridge, in downtown, the pair allegedly "turned on her," police ​Supt. Danny Smyth ​said Wednesday, adding Rinelle was attacked early Saturday, just after midnight, and ended up in the frigid river.

Soaking wet and wearing few clothes, she managed to crawl out of the river a little upstream from where the assault happened, Smyth said. She was then attacked a second time, beaten with a weapon, and "left for dead," he said.

Rinelle was found unconscious by a passerby on the Assiniboine riverwalk at 7 a.m. Saturday. She was rushed to hospital in critical condition and is now in stable condition.

Police said the two males then went on to attack a 23-year-old woman in a similar way at about 2:30 a.m. Saturday, in the area of Portage Avenue and Sherbrook Street, in the city's West End,

The males struck up a conversation with the woman before attacking her with a weapon. She was forced into a back lane where she was sexually assaulted by both men, police said.

They left her there unconscious, but she was later able to get to a nearby residence and contact police, Smyth said.