Denim Day is a sexual violence awareness campaign which all started in 1999, when an eight-teen year old girl was raped.

She was picked up by her married forty-five year old driving teacher for her first lesson. When they were at an isolated road he made her pull over and tried to pulling her out of the car. She tried to escape but he managed to pull her out by one leg and then forcefully raped her. He threatened to kill her if she told her parents, and then made her drive home. Later that day she told her parents and they helped her press charges.

The driving instructor was arrested and prosecuted. He was convicted of rape and sent to jail.

He appeals the sentence. Then this case made  to the Italian Supreme Court in just a couple of days. The case was then over turned and dismissed and the perpetrator was released. The argument that won his freedom was made by the chief judge and he argued that “because the victim wore very, very tight jeans, she had to help him remove them, and by removing the jeans it was no longer rape but consensual sex.”

Women in the Italian Parliament were enraged over the judge’s verdict and decided to make an impact and agreed to wear jeans to work. “This call to action motivated and emboldened the California Senate and Assembly to do the same, which in turn spread to Patricia Giggans, Executive Director of peace over violence, and Denim Day in LA was born.”