UPDATED: Dec. 2, 2021 at 5:42 p.m.

Editor’s Note: This story contains mentions of rape.

Alice Sebold, a Syracuse University graduate and author of “The Lovely Bones,” apologized to the man now exonerated for her rape on Tuesday.

In a post on medium.com, Sebold said that she was “truly sorry” to Anthony Broadwater, who served over 16 years in prison after being convicted of raping Sebold. Despite the charge, Broadwater has maintained his innocence and was exonerated last week.

Sebold’s book “Lucky” detailed Sebold’s 1981 rape in Thornden Park while she was a freshman at SU.

Broadwater spent 16 years in prison for the crime after being convicted in 1982. He was denied parole at least five times, according to CNN, and had remained on New York state’s public sex offender registry since his release in 1998.

“My goal in 1982 was justice — not to perpetuate injustice,” Sebold wrote. “And certainly not to forever, and irreparably, alter a young man’s life by the very crime that had altered mine.”

Months after the rape, Sebold saw Broadwater on a street in Syracuse and thought he was her rapist. She would then fail to identify Broadwater in a police lineup, according to a CNN report.

Broadwater’s conviction was based on evidence from Sebold’s recognition of Broadwater and analysis of hair found at the scene, according to The New York Times. The hair analysis is now largely regarded to be a flawed and inaccurate forensic tool.

In the blog post, Sebold said that she was most sorry for the potential life that was taken from Broadwater. Sebold wrote that no apology could change what happened to him.

She continued, saying she will continue to struggle with her action in a system that sent Broadwater to jail for a crime he did not commit.

“I will also grapple with the fact that my rapist will, in all likelihood, never be known, may have gone on to rape other women, and certainly will never serve the time in prison that Mr. Broadwater did,” she added.

The publisher of “Lucky,” Scribner, and its parent company Simon & Schuster, will stop publication of the book until proper revisions can be made, Ben Belfiglio, Scribner’s vice president of publicity and marketing, told CNN on Tuesday.

In Sebold’s blog post, she said that Broadwater was a victim of racial prejudice.

“I am grateful that Mr. Broadwater has finally been vindicated, but the fact remains that 40 years ago, he became another young Black man brutalized by our flawed legal system,” Sebold said.

CORRECTION: A previous version of this post misstated the title of the Alice Sebold book that details her 1981 rape and will no longer be published until proper revisions have been made. The title of the memoir is “Lucky.” The Daily Orange regrets this error.

Published on December 1, 2021 at 8:13 pm

Contact Kyle: kschouin@syr.edu | @Kyle_Chouinard