Crash Into Me

by Liz Seccuro

  The sun came up as I made coffee and fed Ava breakfast. My day was filled with busywork and e-mails, planning for Christmas dinner and ordering holiday gifts online.

  I had just put Ava down for a nap when there was a sharp knock at the door.

  Still in velour sweatpants and a messy ponytail, I looked out to see two police officers standing on my porch.

  They showed me their Greenwich Police Department badges when I opened the door.

  “Good morning, ma’am,” one said. “We have word about your situation from Chief Longo of Charlottesville. He wanted us to come by and get a feel for the house and what’s been happening.”

  “Sure,” I said, “come on in.” I offered them coffee and they accepted.

  One took out a notepad.

  They asked to see the letter and some of the e-mails. They asked me questions about my daily routine. They took a good look around and studied the front and back doors, as well as the side windows and the basement access. They asked if I had a security system. I did not.

  My house was the only house at the top of a hill, accessible by one road. If a car was coming up the drive, the driver was either lost or destined for my house. The two officers promised to station a patrol car at the bottom of the hill until they received further notice from the Charlottesville Police Department, and I felt more secure when they left.

  That evening, after I had put Ava to bed in her crib, the phone rang again. It was Detective Nicholas Rudman of the Charlottesville police. He said he had had a meeting with the chief, had studied all the materials I had sent, and had some questions for me. Would now be a good time?

  Detective Rudman walked me through the basics again, asked more detailed questions about the e-mail correspondence and confirmed that the Greenwich officers had made contact.

  “Ms. Seccuro, would you be willing to come to Charlottesville and give us a statement?” I pondered the logistics of this and thought, why not? We could make a weekend of it. The last time I had visited Charlottesville was for my fifteenth college reunion, when Ava was six months old. I told him I would do it.

  “Great. Ideally, we would like to interview you sooner rather than later.”

  I didn’t quite comprehend the urgency after all this time, but asked if I could call him back.

  “Absolutely,” he said. “Why don’t you make arrangements and let us know when you’ll be in town? And, hey, thanks for sharing this with us. What you are doing is very brave. I’m going to be working with my partner, Detective Scott Godfrey, on this, so if you get a call from him, know that it’s my partner. I look forward to meeting you.”

  I phoned Mike at the office and we agreed to go that Friday night and stay for two nights. I called the Boar’s Head Inn and booked a room with a crib for Ava. I called Detective Rudman and he said that he and Detective Godfrey would pick me up at the hotel Saturday at noon. I also e-mailed Courteney Stuart at the Hook to tell her about these developments, and that I would be coming to town. We agreed to meet while I was there.

  On December 9 we checked into our hotel room at the inn. At noon the next day, Detectives Rudman and Godfrey were in the lobby to meet me.

  We shook hands all around and they asked if we could take a drive before going down to the station. I sat in the passenger seat of the squad car as we set off down the road toward the main campus, with Detective Rudman behind the wheel and Detective Godfrey in the backseat. We exchanged pleasantries about my drive down, the upcoming holidays, my daughter. I tried to breathe deeply. It was a glorious late-fall day with deep blue skies and brilliant sunshine, the kind of day that always reminded me why I loved Virginia.

  “Liz, we wanted to get a sense of your memory. Could you take us to some of the places you mentioned in your statements to us and Chief Longo?” asked Godfrey.

  “Sure,” I said. As we drove, I pointed out the salmon-colored building that housed the university police and told them of my visits there. I told them a bit about my meetings there with Sybil Todd and the university police. We continued on, stopping near Rugby Road and the Rotunda. I pointed left to the Phi Kappa Psi house, sitting gracefully at the head of Madison Bowl.

  “Drive down the street,” I urged. We drove past Phi Psi.

  I pointed to a few windows. “That’s the room I was raped in,” I said, gesturing toward the second-floor window on the far right. “If you go around to the other street, there’s another window overlooking Madison Lane, and the bed was flush against that window.”

  “Can you take us the way that you walked to the emergency room?”

  “Absolutely. Turn back onto Emmett Street. I walked this way.” The emergency room had been renovated, but I showed them where the entrance had formerly been in the rear, where I walked. The memories were hard and I swallowed my saliva.

  Next, we doubled back and drove toward the main part of the campus, to my dorm, and parked. We walked in, turned right, and walked up the stairs to the second floor. We turned right, then quickly left, and at the end of the long hall I saw the door to my room.

  I touched the door, almost caressing it. I felt overwhelmingly sad as I stood there, feeling so much older, but still so frightened. Rudman knocked and tried to open it, but it was locked. I explained how Beebe had written the threatening note on the door in black marker. They thought perhaps current scientific testing could reveal the words that had been written even after all these years. I showed them the communal bathroom where I had showered, the hallway where I saw Beebe running with his friend after leaving the note and taking his jacket. I pointed out the names of friends who lived in each room and was amazed at my own power of recall. They took copious notes, jotting down every name and room number. They asked me if I could find these people on the alumni Web site and I said that I could.

  Continuing our drive around campus, I pointed out the buildings that housed Dean Canevari’s office, Dean Todd’s office, the various libraries, dining halls, and bookstores. We drove to Chancellor Lane to see my sorority house, where Beebe had delivered the pizzas. The flood of memories was bittersweet, as this was a place I had loved.

  Finally, we began our drive to the downtown Mall and the police department, a nondescript building at the very end. We walked into a large conference room, furnished with a large wooden table and a few file cabinets. I sat in a chair as they brought in soft drinks, notepads, and audio equipment. They asked if I was comfortable and if I was ready to tell what had happened to me that night in October 1984.

  It had been twenty years since I had spoken about this night in such detail, from beginning to end. Telling it now, especially being back in Charlottesville, was the oddest sensation.

  I asked for a piece of paper as I drew a layout of Phi Kappa Psi—the common rooms, the foosball table, the kitchen, the staircase, the second-floor room, the bar. I drew a rough diagram of the room in which I had been raped, mapping out the doorway, the bed, the loft, the sofa, the windows, the closet, the dresser. I drew myself as a stick figure on the bed and on the sofa where I had awoken.

  In order to describe Beebe and some of the other brothers, I stood up and asked Detective Godfrey to stand in order to describe height and weight. I took off my high-heeled boots to demonstrate my own height. I could hear the clock on the wall ticking softly.

  As we got to the minutes before the attack, I stood to pantomime the chair where Beebe held me down around my waist, the doorway where I was lifted by another brother into Beebe’s arms, and the padlocked door where I screamed and pounded for my friend Hud.

  And then we came to the part where I had to describe the rape itself. I stumbled frequently, but their questions were calm and direct.

  “Where was he touching you?”

  “Did he penetrate you with his hands?”

  “Did he penetrate you in other ways?”

  “Yes,” I paused. Did I have to say it?

  As if reading my mind, Rudman said, “Liz, I know this is difficult, but you have to tell us where he penetrated yo
u.”

  “He forced his penis and his hands into my vagina.” I started to cry. “I tried to fight him off, but he was so heavy and he was hurting me.”

  I looked up and saw a tear rolling down Detective Godfrey’s face.

  “Did you report this to anyone?”

  They knew the answers, but they had to go on the record. I described my visit to the hospital, my talks with my resident adviser, and subsequent meetings at the dean’s office and with the university police.

  My whole statement took over two hours. The story I had kept buried came pouring forth, the details fresh. People were listening to me, hearing me, and I would never be silent again.

  “I think we have enough here,” said Rudman, clicking off the tape.

  I got up to stretch and put my boots back on. Godfrey asked, “Do you have the letter with you?”

  Digging in my purse, I offered the letter. He asked to keep it, and made me a photocopy before tucking the original into a file folder. Then, they asked me to sit down again.

  Leaning forward, Detective Rudman asked, “Would you like to press charges against William Nottingham Beebe for your rape in October of 1984?”

  With that question, a new journey would begin for me. The emotions were too much to bear and I began to sob.

  “Yes,” I said. “Yes, I would like to press charges, please.”

  They thanked me for my time, my story, my bravery. They said they’d be in touch with me to explain the next steps, and warned me that the road ahead would be a long one. They gave me their cards and I hugged them both as we exited the conference room.

  It had been a long, exhausting day. Mike and Ava were waiting for me when we stepped out into the sunlight.

  Rudman and Godfrey introduced themselves and marveled over Ava. I scooped up my daughter and hugged her tightly as we went on our way. I was a normal wife and mother again. Mike attempted to ask me some questions about how it had gone, but I wasn’t ready. I wanted my baby girl to see me smiling, so Mike just held my hand and we took Ava to the ice cream shop down the street.

  Later that day, I met with Courteney Stuart and her photographer from the Hook, Jen Fariello, to continue our interview and have photos taken for the story we were working on. They were both so professional and friendly, putting me immediately at ease, despite the day I had already had. It felt good to unload my story.

  The next steps came as soon as we returned to Greenwich. First, the police had to ensure that the e-mail address and computer that the e-mails were coming from indeed belonged to William Beebe. The computer crimes desk of the CPD contacted me, and we were able to determine conclusively that the e-mails had come from him.

  In the following days, I combed through the online alumni directory, providing Rudman and Godfrey with every detail of every witness I could remember. This became a full-time job, but it was good to feel that I was actually doing something for myself, and was no longer stuck staring at my computer screen, anxiously, fearfully awaiting Beebe’s e-mails. On December 19, 2005, Rudman and Godfrey flew to Las Vegas to obtain a search warrant for Beebe’s home there; they worked with the Las Vegas police. However, two days later, when they set out with Vegas police detectives to visit Beebe’s house, there was no one home. When they reached Beebe on his cell phone, he said he was in Florida on a business trip. Rudman questioned him further on the phone, and Beebe admitted that he had indeed written those e-mails to me and that the content was his own writing. He also admitted that he had had sex with me in October 1984 and that I had been incapacitated at the time. Although he wouldn’t use the word himself, that, by definition, is rape. Using Beebe’s instructions to disarm his home alarm, the police entered the house. They needed evidence in order to obtain an arrest warrant. They seized Beebe’s computer, a journal with handwriting that matched that in the letter to me, and an electric bill with his name and address on it, proving residence. On December 23 Godfrey and Rudman traveled back to Charlottesville with the evidence, before joining their families for the holidays.

  A few days after Christmas, the police contacted Assistant Commonwealth Attorney Claude Worrell. His job was to ascertain whether there was enough evidence for an arrest and, subsequently, a prosecutable case. Worrell was professional and friendly and I put my faith in him entirely.

  But as the days dragged on and no arrest was made, I became very anxious. Unfamiliar with the criminal process, I had no idea how long these things could take. We had a confession, corroboration, evidence—what else did they need? And as I learned more about William Beebe, I became more disturbed. Although he had sent me a business card from his realty office, he had not actually worked as a real estate agent in almost three years. Rather, he was working as a massage therapist, touching the bodies of clients who presumably trusted him. It was becoming increasingly difficult to think of this admitted rapist enjoying a free life. Of course, he had been doing so for years, but now that the wheels were in motion, I needed closure.

  On January 4, 2006, Sergeant Rick Hudson, a trusted colleague of Chief Longo, called me. William Beebe was in custody at the Clark County Detention Center in Las Vegas. He had gone without much of a fight. For the first time in ages I felt calm, and safe.

  At my computer the next day, I logged onto the corrections center system and typed in his name. Checking the local news stations online, I watched Beebe’s arrest footage, but couldn’t bear to look at the actual mug shot. I had not seen him since the pizza delivery in 1986. I struggled mightily with that photograph—and still do. It’s like staring at the face of evil.

  Beebe spent six days in the Vegas jail before being extradited to Virginia. A Charlottesville judge set his bond at $40,000. I felt renewed frustration when Beebe quickly paid the amount and was free again, pending trial.

  Beebe hired two well-known Charlottesville criminal defense attorneys, Rhonda Quagliana and Francis McQ. Lawrence, of the firm St. John, Bowling, Lawrence & Quagliana. Ms. Quagliana was a beautiful and accomplished woman, a graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law who was married to a local judge. Men accused of rape often choose female defense attorneys, who might make them seem more sympathetic to juries. Quagliana was a good choice for Beebe and she answered the charges with all guns blazing.

  “It was a too-much-to-drink college sex event,” Quagliana told the Hook, “and it was something that had plagued his conscience for a long time.” She said that when Beebe admitted the rape in his e-mails and to police, he was simply following the advice of another victim “who was trying to help him understand where Miss Seccuro was coming from and what her thinking was.” In her account, Beebe was shocked when I filed charges, because he had only been “trying to do the right thing … Unfortunately, young people in college do things they regret,” she said. “He was trying to apologize for one of those things.”

  Quagliana promised that details would emerge to exonerate her client. “This was bad behavior, poor judgment, immature, and all those other things,” she said, “but it was not a rape.”

  Interest in this case, and controversy surrounding it, was just heating up. A tsunami was headed toward Greenwich. It was called the media.

  CHAPTER 7 The Media Beast and

  What She Eats

  C ommonwealth of Virginia v. William Beebe was the name of the case—the Commonwealth was bringing charges against someone who had broken its laws. I had been just seventeen at the time of the rape, so it was a case of sexual assault against a minor, and as such, I was referred to only as Jane Doe in the filings. Still, my anonymity did not last long. I hadn’t anticipated how much interest the media would have in my case, or how quickly they would find me. It didn’t help that someone at the Charlottesville juvenile courthouse had neglected to black out my real name in two instances on the indictment. On the day of Beebe’s arrest, Chief Longo held his brief, somber press conference on the steps of Charlottesville City Hall. Almost immediately, our home phone—which had always been an unlisted number—and even my cell pho
ne started ringing off the hook with reporters asking for comments. My BlackBerry was abuzz with further requests. I didn’t want to make any public statements, and I definitely did not want to say anything that might jeopardize the case. We didn’t know what to say on the phone except “She is not available.” But the media do not give up easily. By the next morning, the AP wire had picked up the story, and life as I knew it came to an abrupt end. The phone calls were just the beginning. Two days later, laden with a sleepy two-year-old and an SUV filled with groceries, I turned into my driveway in the early evening. At the bottom of the hill on Lake Avenue, news trucks were idling with their lights off, as if I would be too stupid to notice. I gunned my engine and hightailed it up the hill. Parking alongside the house, instead of in the garage, I left my groceries and sprinted into the house through the rear kitchen entrance with Ava in my arms. I slammed the door, locked it, and lowered all of the miniblinds. As if on cue, there was an aggressive slamming of our knocker out at the front door—it was only a matter of time before they found the back entrance.

  Mike came into the kitchen and I could only point my finger toward the front door with fright in my eyes. Ava and I crawled underneath the kitchen table. I pretended it was a game and put my finger to my lips with an exaggerated “Shhhhhh …” She giggled and became a happy co-conspirator as we huddled together in our secret spot, pretending to hide from Daddy. I didn’t want to face the cameras; more important, I didn’t want anyone taking pictures of Ava. My first responsibility was to protect her.

  Bang! Bang! Bang!

  I finally heard the door open and a bit of a scuffle with Mike’s loud voice echoing off the walls. He did not sound happy. Leaning out from under my table, I could spy a little throng of lights, cameras, and people. Mike was explaining that I would not be speaking to them, when I whispered to Ava that I would go “find” Daddy. At the door, Mike looked surprised, but I let loose on the little group.