Memoirs of A Healer/Clinical Social Worker: Autobiography of Bruce Whealton

Chapter 64: Interrogating the Victim - Profound Injustice

And the most terrifying question of all may be just how much horror the human mind can stand and still maintain a wakeful, staring, unrelenting sanity.
- Stephen King, from "Pet Sematary"

Please, dear reader, let me imagine you are with me as I tell my horror story and try to imagine the comfort that I need when I am so scared like now.

Within just more than an hour, with the sun getting low now, the police showed up again. The most disturbing nightmare of my life was about to begin. My attacker had done a larger and far more sinister evil than brutally attacking me and leaving me literally covered in blood.

I noticed lights outside.

Then there was a female police officer in the doorway next to the stairway that led to the second floor. It was a warm day, this October 15th of 2004.

I heard something repeated on the police radio that a woman had been sexually assaulted out here!

What! Oh, my God!

This is not happening! No, no, no.no.

The police were just here. They knew what happened. They witnessed the extensive nature of my injuries.

It had not occurred to me that this would be hard to believe.

Time moved at an excruciatingly slow pace. I was waiting to speak to someone and clear all this up. Surely, they would know what had really happened. They had been out here just an hour earlier.

The Inquisition, Torture, And Humiliation

Before I knew it, I was being put in a handcuff and put into a police car. I struggled to speak. My mouth was dry, and I could barely draw a breath. I wasn't sure my words were being heard when I said, "no, I was attacked."

I was terrified beyond belief. I wasn't shaking but I was frozen. I felt dazed and confused. It seemed impossible.

Then I started to move from the frozen reaction of a trauma victim to the fight or flight stress response - a misnomer since neither fight nor flight was on my mind.

On the ride with the policeman next to me, my female friend called me. My hands were shaking as I tried to pick up the phone. My heart was beating so fast, and I was fumbling with the phone. My voice was shaking as I said "Hello,"

I began to explain what happened to me. I wanted the police officer to hear me and the sincerity of my words.

I told her that I wanted to see her soon and that this will get all straightened out, but I didn't know about tomorrow.

She was shocked herself. I can imagine her desperately out of words to say to comfort me.

Choking on my tears I said, "I'm scared. I don't know how this happened to me."

She knew a little about me and so she recognized the concern in my voice. I heard compassion in her voice as she said how sorry she was that this was happening to me.

I then hung up the phone. I registered the fact that someone had said that she was the landlord's wife. The landlord who had evicted me recently.

The police officer had handcuffs on me and took me inside a police station. I saw the woman who attacked me inside the doorway, and I said, "she's the one who attacked me."

I was still holding onto reality.

They sat me down outside a room somewhere. I was asked to wait. It didn't seem like anything was happening. I tried calling the pre-paid legal provider firm as I had maintained an account with them. I never imagined I would need it for a criminal matter.