PD gets 220 e-mails on rape story

When Joanna Connors of the Plain Dealer agreed to tell the story of her 1984 rape in the paper's pages, she expected strong reaction, Joe Strupp reports in Editor & Publisher.

But even she was surprised at how many of the 220 or so e-mails and voicemails responding to the special section in Sunday's paper about her experience were from women who had been raped, but had never told anyone.

"Two people at the paper came up to me and said they had been raped and one had never told anyone," Connors, 54, told E&P.. "So many of the people in the voice mails and e-mails said so, too. We really absorb that message [as victims] that it is uncomfortable for everyone." Connors was actually raped while on the job during her stint as a Plain Dealer theater critic. She writes in the first of several stories that ran Sunday about being attacked at the student theater of nearby Case Western University by a man who cornered her in the empty backstage area.

The story and a video can be found on Cleveland.com or click on the headline to read all of Strupp's account.