Anthony Sowell murder trial could retraumatize survivors of sexual assault

CLEVELAND - The Cleveland Rape Crisis Center is ready to help sexual assault survivors who feel retraumatized by the  Anthony Sowell trial.

"It can often be a revictimizing for survivors who are watching this," President and CEO Megan O'Bryan said. "It can be traumatic to hear the stories of sexual assault."

Sowell is charged with the mass murders of 11 women whose bodies were found at his house on Imperial Avenue.

The Rape Crisis Center has seen a spike in the number of survivors reaching out for their services since the bodies were discovered in October 2009, and expects even more people to call during the trial.

"For some people that [Sowell's] face respresents what their life could have been if only just by happenstance that they didn't end up near Imperial Avenue or in the neighborhood," Vice President of Community Engagement Sondra Miller said. "For others it represents a quiet problem that they've had in their life that they've had to silence, that they've had to bury, they've had to forget about it, and his face triggers that feeling of anxiety. It triggers flashbacks.  It triggers nightmares and what you're trying to bury and what you're trying to forget about, it just keeps coming up and up and up."

Miller said the Rape Crisis Center focuses on the present and how survivors can find more joy in their lives today.

"We teach healthy ways to cope," she said.

The Cleveland Rape Crisis Center's 24 hour hotline is (216) 619-6192.