Don’t Look Behind You

realize that there were no rules or parameters in sexual assaults. Since then, as a true-crime writer, I have covered a dozen or so rape cases that defy imagination.
    There was the case of a rapist who insisted that his victim fix him a pork chop dinner—after he had assaulted her! He gobbled it down and left without hurting her further. And one sex criminal was so violent that he “raped” his victim with a .32 caliber pistol, actually firing it into her vagina. Miraculously, she survived and was even able to bear children after this happened to her. Another dangerous felon arrived at the apartment of three young women with a note of recommendation from one of their friends—which he had forged. A still more bizarre case involved a fastidious offender whodemanded that his victim take a long bath before he raped her.
    I remember a paroled felon who had his college tuition paid by the state—to help him succeed once he was out in society. Sex crimes detectives discovered he was skipping class at least two times a week so he could commit rapes in the university neighborhood. One of his victims was the daughter of a police officer.
    I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised by the peculiar obsessions and actions of sexual criminals. Although most look like ordinary people, they are very different from law-abiding citizens.
    It is virtually impossible to teach women how to avoid and/or survive the crime of rape; what works for some puts others in terrible danger. We all know the basics, although we don’t always adhere to them:
    • Lock your doors securely.
    • Lock your car even when you run into a store “just for a minute or two.”
    • Don’t pick up hitchhikers.
    • Don’t meet an absolute stranger in your home—or his.
    • Arrange to meet in a public place and let someone know where you are.
    • Don’t walk alone in bad neighborhoods after the sun goes down. Or
any
neighborhood!
    • Don’t believe everything prospective dates list about themselves on internet dating sites.
    • Check out someone you don’t know as carefully as you can.
    • Don’t open your car door or your home’s door to someone you don’t know. If it’s an emergency, tell them you will call the police for them.
    Most of this is simple common sense. Rapists don’t all look daunting. Nor do most serial killers. Often, they are quite handsome, charming, and persuasive—until they manage to get a woman in a lonely place far from anyone who might help her.
    Experts advise women to do anything they can to alert others that they are in trouble. Scream, shout, kick, and fight. Sadly, more bystanders react to “Fire!” than they do to “Help!”
    Anyone over sixty remembers Kitty Genovese of Queens, New York, who screamed “Help!” on the frigid, pitch-black night of March 13, 1964. Kitty, a petite, dark-haired twenty-eight-year-old bar manager, encountered a sex killer at 3 a.m. as she got out of her car and headed for her apartment. Thirty-eight people heard her cries and ignored them, not wanting to get involved, believing someone else would save her.
    Winston Moseley, twenty-nine, had set out to kill a woman that night—any woman—when Kitty saw him approaching in her Kew Gardens neighborhood. Without saying a word, he stabbed her twice. She called out, “Oh, God! He stabbed me. Please help me!”
    Windows lit up and a few people looked out. One man even called out, “Leave that girl alone!” Still, no one called police or rushed downstairs to help her. Moseley was alarmed by the lights going on, and was preparingto drive off when the windows darkened again. Like a cat stalking an injured mouse, he followed Kitty to the doorway of her apartment house. Once more, she cried out, “I’m dying! I’m dying!” He stabbed her again—and raped her.
    Finally, a neighboring apartment dweller called for police and paramedics, and then bravely ran downstairs to rock Kitty in her arms. But Kitty was dead.
    Arrested, Moseley admitted to detectives that he had killed another woman. He escaped custody for a short time and raped a pregnant woman. Kitty Genovese has become a tragic poster girl for the apathy of people who look the other way when they see someone in danger.
    If Kitty had yelled, “Fire!” would she still be alive? Psychological studies have shown that when a number of people witness an accident or a crime in progress, it’s easy for them to believe someone else will help.
    A few years ago, I spoke at a rape