Free Cry Rape: The True Story of One Woman's Harrowing Quest for Justice by Bill Lueders Page B

to these events?
    He said he would. Did he have any involvement in Patty’s sexual assault? None. Was there any reason his fingerprints or pubic hair would be found in Patty’s bedroom? Not unless someone moved them there from someplace else, he insisted. “I’ve never been in her room.”
    Seeing that Dominic was upset, Woodmansee escalated. He announced that Patty believed he was the person who sexually assaulted her. “You’re kidding!” he responded. Woodmansee explained that Dominic was facing serious potential charges; he continued to deny involvement. The detective said he had reason to believe Dominic knew more about the incident than he was letting on. Dominic reacted with alarm.
    “If you want samples or whatever you want, you can have them. Right here, right now, tonight,” he sputtered. “I was not in that goddamn room!”
    Dominic then came up with a theory for why Patty would accuse him: “Sir, I swear, she’s overreacting because Misty and I started dating.” This came a moment after saying that, as far as he knew, Patty bore him no ill will. He also speculated that Patty was biased against him because of Brenda and because he was involved with drugs.
    The detectives may have figured, with some justification, that anyone dumb enough to make an admission like this to the police was probably not smart enough to lie about a sexual assault. Dominic continued Misty and Dominic
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    to protest his innocence, making what Woodmansee would describe as
    “severe body movements” in his chair. “There’s no way I would ever do that,” he insisted. “If I’m going to have sex, I want it to be intimate.” He reiterated his willingness to submit to tests.
    But Woodmansee and Draeger didn’t ask him for samples. They told Dominic he was still a suspect and escorted him from the building, a little more than two hours after the interview began. Woodmansee never made any attempt to check out Dominic’s alibi or investigate other individuals whose names were provided as possible suspects.
    By this time, Woodmansee’s focus had shifted. He was no longer investigating an alleged sexual assault. He was investigating the alleged victim.

    7
    Another Suspect
    It didn’t take long for Patty to find out what Woodmansee had done.
    Misty heard from Dominic, who was livid, and confronted her mother.
    Patty promptly backed down, saying she didn’t think it was Dominic and hadn’t meant to accuse him.
    A number of things, thought Patty, made Dominic the most likely suspect. These she had discussed with Brenda, who wrote out a list.
    Dominic knew the door would be unlocked and how to find his way around the apartment. He sometimes came in late, after filling up on booze and drugs. The cologne seemed to match. He had the same skin color. He liked to have Brenda wrap her legs around him during sex, just as the rapist had done, and expressed interest in anal sex.
    Still, Patty was never sure it was Dominic and was distressed that Woodmansee had confronted him. She had expected police to examine the evidence and make an arrest based on what it revealed. Telling Dominic that she had named him as her assailant and then letting him go was not what she had in mind. As soon as she found out, that Thursday, September 11, she left Woodmansee a voice-mail message expressing her concern.
    Woodmansee didn’t get Patty’s message right away because he was at Meriter Hospital, talking to the SANE nurse, Jill Poarch. He had her provide a synopsis of her exam, and he viewed the tape of the colposcope that documented Patty’s injuries. The anal abrasion, she noted, looked more like a fingernail scratch than something caused by penile penetration. Woodmansee asked if it could have been self-inflicted.
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    Another Suspect
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    Poarch said this was possible but felt it was consistent with a rapist trying to “gain penetration.”
    The detective was working on a different theory—that the rape never happened. As Poarch