Shane Dunphy: A sex assault victim may never find peace

ONCE VIBRANT: Michelle Hennessy committed suicide after she had been sexually assaulted; even with love and support, the damage done by a sex attack can be insurmountable

Shane Dunphy

November 24 2013 12:33 AM

IN the photo, Michelle Hennessy, 25, looks serenely beautiful. Her red hair catches the light and she gazes wistfully into the middle distance as if she recalling a fondly held memory.

As I looked at that image of Michelle – who took her own life in 2012 – across the print media this week, I was powerfully reminded of a girl I used to work with many years ago. For the purpose of this article, I'll call her Jessica. At 17 she was a little younger than Michelle, but the similarities are still striking.

Just like Michelle, Jessica was a strong, vibrant young woman. She wanted to see the world and she had a particular fascination for desert places; she mentioned to me once that she loved the idea of all that open space, all the freedom.

When Jessica took her own life I was at work on another case, and my manager called me on my mobile phone. I remember sitting in my car and thinking: you're free now, girl. Go and find your desert. And then I cried.

The reason for Jessica's drastic action was not a mystery to me or anyone else who knew her: two years almost to the day she died this beautiful, bright, amazing, young woman was walking home from a friend's house when she was met by three young men who dragged her into a field and brutally sexually and physically assaulted her.

Michelle Hennessy met with similar misfortune: a chance meeting with 20-year-old Sean Thackaberry ended in him sexually assaulting her.

While the links between Jessica's and Michelle's deaths and the violence they experienced are unquestionable, many families and friends are left wondering how it is that such strong, clear-headed people can become so irrevocably overwhelmed by a single experience. The truth is that, with all the love, help and support in the world, the damage done by a sexual attack can sometimes be insurmountable.

Jessica was, by any standards, a classically pretty girl: blonde hair, slim, naturally athletic. She had always done well at school, generally achieving honours grades across the board. She had an enviable relationship with both parents, and enjoyed a network of friendships both in school and her local community. All that was before the attack, of course.

When I was first asked to work with Jessica, the girl I met was hollow-eyed, dangerously underweight and completely isolated from teachers friends and family.

At school she would pace up and down in a corner of the yard, avoiding all contact with others; at home, she rushed straight to her room and locked the door. Once so vibrant, Jessica had become frightened by people – all people. She was convinced that everyone knew what had happened (regrettably most did: she lived in a small village) and was horrified at the prospect of being asked about her experience. Even an innocent "how are you doing?" seemed sinister.

And there were some for whom this was true – Jessica was accused of making up the attack, of sensationalising what had happened. One group of spiteful girls suggested to her that she had led her attackers on, and therefore deserved what had happened.

Her grades plummeted as she disengaged from her studies, her terror of what she had experienced – and she was convinced, must surely experience again – made it impossible for her to focus on anything else.

I learned quickly that she had begun starving herself almost immediately after the attack, convinced that she was fat and ugly, somehow believing that the assault had somehow visibly tainted her.

When things got very tough, Jessica indulged in self-harming – using a Stanley knife to cut grooves into her arms and legs. When I asked her about this, she very matter-of-factly informed me that it was all about control: those boys had taken hers – even dominion of her body and what was done with it – away from her. Now she was taking it back. She assured me she was being responsible about it, making certain she did not cut too deeply or anywhere she might hit a vein or an artery, and she always sterilised her blade first. Somehow, that level of forethought made it seem all the worse.

Sometimes Jessica would experience terrifying flashbacks. She might be walking home from school or sitting in the library, and all of a sudden she would be right back there in the middle of the attack again. At these moments she would freeze, going almost rigid, strangled, muffled cries coming from her constricted throat.

People observing generally thought she was having a seizure, and the fact that she would often throw up when the horror had passed just reinforced the incorrect conclusion. Jessica responded to me slowly: at our first meetings she did not utter a single word, choosing instead to sit with her eyes lowered at the table. When I kept coming back despite her reticence, and she saw that I was not a threat, she seemed to decide that it was okay to engage me in conversation, and in a tentative, faltering way our friendship blossomed.

She would talk about anything except her attack. The aftermath, how it made her feel, how she was responding to the experience – that was all fine. But the night she encountered those three thugs was out of bounds.

She started to eat again, putting back on some of the weight she had lost. Some of her more enduring friendships were rekindled, and her school work even improved a little. I managed to organise some sessions with a therapist whom she felt comfortable with, and after six months of intensive work, it seemed my part of Jessica's story was over.

A month after I stopped seeing her, she was dead.

Jessica's attackers were never prosecuted, as she was unable to ever identify them, yet we need only look to how similar crimes are dealt with to see how they might have fared. Sean Thackaberry, for example, has been sentenced to seven and a half years in prison, with the final two and a half suspended.

I am not a believer in an eye for an eye, but surely we need to reassess how crimes that rob the victim – and society – of so much are dealt with by our legal system.

Michelle and Jennifer deserved better. We should learn from their deaths.

Shane Dunphy is a child protection expert and author