She Accused A TV Anchor Of Rape And Got Dragged Through The Tabloids

Jessica Testa
When Maria Di Toro walked into a New York Police Department precinct late one night in January 2012, she knew her story was, as she said, "complicated." Nearly four months earlier, she had told officers, one of the best-connected young men in New York had raped her. She didn't realize then what making such an allegation would mean: Sixteen days after she reported it, her picture was on the front page of the New York Post with the headline "Shady Lady."

Had Di Toro met up with almost any other man that day in October 2011, she would never have landed on the Post's radar, much less its cover. (A spokeswoman for the paper didn't respond to requests to comment for this story.) But when she named Greg Kelly — morning show host at the Fox affiliate and son of the police commissioner — details of Di Toro's report almost immediately spilled into a local news machine that pitted this unknown woman against a public figure with close ties to both media and law enforcement.

In a recent series of interviews with BuzzFeed, Di Toro spoke openly for the first time about the experience. When her case initially went public, she declined reporters' offers to comment. She asked her family and friends, many barraged by calls and unexpected visits from reporters, to also refrain. The tabloids eventually moved on, but Di Toro didn't know how, she said. After two gnawing years of following other high-profile rape cases — and a city government regime change — she began considering what it would mean to tell her story publicly. She said she feels stronger today, with the kind of durability she didn't have when the media beckoned before. Then, she was playing defense — like when she begged the photographer who took her modeling headshots not to sell them after he called her to say the Post had made an offer. (He sold them.)


http://www.buzzfeed.com/jtes/she-accused-a-tv-anchor-of-rape-and-got-dragged-through-the?s=mobile