Author Alice Sebold Apologises To Man Wrongly Convicted Of Raping Her In 1981

American author Alice Sebold has issued an apology after the exoneration of a man falsely convicted of raping her back in 1981. Her memoir Lucky elaborated on how she was raped and that soon after the incident, she saw a Black man on the road who she told the police could have been the assaulter.

The man, Anthony Broadwater, was arrested, put on trial and sentenced to prison. He spent 16 years in jail, before being cleared of charges last week. Broadwater, acknowledging Sebold's apology, said he was "relieved."

"I am sorry most of all for the fact that the life you could have led was unjustly robbed from you, and I know that no apology can change what happened to you and never will," the statement from Sebold, as quoted by BBC, reads.

Broadwater was released from prison in 1998 but his name reportedly remained on the sex offenders list, making life and employment difficult for him. A re-examination of his case revealed serious flaws in the investigation and his conviction was overturned on November 22.

Alice Sebold Rape Allegations: What You Should Know

Sebold was 18 when she was a first-year student at New York's Syracuse University. In Lucky, she writes she was raped while walking near campus. However, no suspects could be identified after she approached the police to give her statement. Five months later, she spotted a Black man, who was Broadwater, walking near campus and thought he could have been the rapist.

She approached the police again but as per CNN, could not successfully identify this suspect in a police lineup. In fact, she picked put another man. Yet, Broadwater was put on trial and convicted on the basis of evidence later found to be faulty.

Lucky was published in 1999, a year after Broadwater was released from prison.

"I will continue to struggle with the role that I unwittingly played within a system that sent an innocent man to jail," Sebold, now 58, said in her statement.

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