The letter

Edie Magnus Correspondent • Profile

CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA. - Liz Seccuro has struggled hard to heal. 21 years ago, she says a stranger suddenly and violently attacked her.  And now, just as suddenly, he’s back. This fall, a letter arrived at her home out of the blue. In October 1984, "I harmed you”, it read.  “I stand prepared...to begin to set right the wrong I’ve done.”

Liz Seccuro: Everyone grows up with the idea of a monster in the closet. But my monster has a name and a face. And now he’s out of the closet.

When the man whom Liz Seccuro calls a monster forced himself back into her life, he may never have imagined what she would do next. His startling letter to her about that night years earlier left her with a choice: forgive him and move on or take action of a far different sort. 

You’ll want to ask yourself: what would you do?

Edie Magnus, Dateline correspondent: He was clearly tormented by this.

Seccuro: As well he should be.

Liz, 39, says the woman you see today is very different from the girl she once was: a child who grew up feeling happy and safe. 

Seccuro: [I had a] very happy childhood. Very sheltered childhood.

Liz’s dad: She was my daddy’s little girl. And mommy’s too.

The only child of a transit worker and a secretary, Liz attended an all girls Catholic high school in Yonkers, just outside New York City,  where she was a member of the drama club, the student council, and a cheerleader. 

Seccuro: I was a huge overachiever.  I don’t think I ever got an A-.

Graduating first in her class in 1984, Liz weighed several college scholarship offers.  She selected the prestigious University of Virginia. 

Seccuro: At the time, I believe their English Department was the #1 rated in the country, and that’s why I went.

Founded by Thomas Jefferson, UVA is considered by some to be one of the nation’s top public universities.  For the 17-year-old  from Yonkers, it was a time full of promise: Liz in fact  was the first person in her family to go to college.

In September 1984, 17-year-old Liz and her best friend Meghan, who would be attending Trinity University in Washington D.C., took the big car trip south together, along with both sets of parents.

Meghan, best friend: We were talking about the future and how just it was gonna be really exciting.  And you know, the people we were gonna meet.

Seccuro: I went to an all girls high school so I guess my first experience with the opposite sex was in college. I’d never even sat in a classroom with a boy before.

Magnus: Is it safe to say then that when you went to college you were somewhat inexperienced?

Seccuro: Inexperienced, yes.  Was I a virgin when I came to UVA?  Absolutely.

Like many schools, the social life at UVA revolved around its many fraternities and sororities.  And that fall, “rush” was in full swing.  Just 4 weeks after arriving on campus, a dorm friend, looking to make a good impression at the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity, leaned on Liz to come with him to a party there. 

Seccuro: A really lovely young man who happened to be gay.  So no safer date existed.  He said you know maybe they’ll let me in.  Maybe I’ll go further in ‘rush’ if I have a pretty girl with me.  He’s like, please please please will you go with me?  I’m like, of course I’ll go.  That’s what you do.  That’s what friends do.

Liz remembers walking into a familiar college scene. There was the requisite clamor of rock music blasting.  A foosball game was in full swing, and there was the acrid scent of beer wafting through the room.  No surprise: a 1984 yearbook photo showcases the fraternity’s party-hearty spirit.

Magnus: Were you drinking?

Seccuro: Yes.  I had one full beer and I had re-filled it.  Was I drinking heavily?  No, absolutely not.  I was completely aware of my surroundings.

The hour drew late and Liz wanted to leave, but before going she says she was coaxed into joining a tour of the frat house. When, she got upstairs, Liz says she was soon separated from the friend who’d brought her there.

Seccuro: And two of the brothers said, well while you’re waiting for your friend, can we fix you something to drink?  And I said, sure.  And they’re like, We call this our ‘House Special.’  It was like a pale green drink, and it was in one of those clear tumblers.  It was something, you know, stronger than I was used to drinking at the time.

Magnus: It was clearly alcoholic.

Seccuro: Oh yeah. 

Liz says the mystery drink made her feel weird.

Seccuro: My arms and legs just didn’t feel quite - felt rubbery.  Or like that of a marionette.  You know, and yet I felt oddly panicky. And I thought, well, once my friend gets back, he can walk me home. That was my concern.  I didn’t want to walk the five minutes back to my dorm alone.  Because it wouldn’t be safe.

Magnus: You thought staying inside the fraternity would be safe.

Seccuro: Correct.

Not hardly.  In the midst of her panicked haziness, Liz says one of the frat brothers hovering in the background started trying to chat her up. 

Magnus: Did you know him?

Seccuro: No.

Magnus: Had you seem ‘em?

Seccuro: Never. Complete stranger to me.

Magnus: So then what happened?

Seccuro: He pulled me into his room. I tried—he had his arms around my waist from behind.  He pulled me down onto his lap.  I tried to get away. 

Magnus: You asked him to stop?

Seccuro: Absolutely.

But instead, Liz, who is slightly built, says the 6-foot-one fraternity brother turned off the light, ripped off her clothes and raped her. 

Seccuro: All I can say is it was it was just extremely painful. Violent.  The brain just protects you from something that is so horrible.  Mine happened cause I remember far too much. And at some point I think my brain said to my body, it’s okay.  Just shut down.  It’s okay to just fall asleep to, just be unconscious.  Because if I  remained conscious through the whole thing, it would have destroyed me.

The 17-year-old says she did not fully regain consciousness until the following morning - when she found herself across the room on a sofa.

Seccuro: I awoke naked wrapped in a bloody sheet, which I thought was vile and disgusting.  And then I realized that it was my own blood.

Remember—she’d been a virgin. In so many ways, Liz says she was never the same after that night.

Seccuro: It’s like you’re being killed.  And yet you still live.  And you live with the memory of it.  There were days where I almost wished I had died, so great is the shame, so great is the degradation and the humiliation.

Liz may not have had a chance to fight back then—but little did she know, she would—more than 20 years later.  And she’d be given the chance—by the alleged attacker himself.

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