Rape Crisis charity praises Duffy for going public with details of four-week abduction ordeal

Warning: Some readers may find details of this article upsetting

Duffy has been praised by the charity Rape Crisis for speaking publicly about being drugged, raped and held captive over a period of four weeks.

The musician had revealed her harrowing ordeal, which took place at some time in the last decade, in February, and gave further details in a written post on 5 April on her website duffywords.com.

Katie Russell, the national spokeswoman for Rape Crisis in England and Wales, told The Guardian that it was “a really bold move to speak publicly, and really commendable”.

She continued: “We know through our frontline work at Rape Crisis why so few victims and survivors do speak about what has happened to them, or indeed report it to the police.”

“It is because there is a lot of shame and stigma still attached to being raped or sexually assaulted and there are a lot of myths and stereotypes out there around the kind of people it happens to. In speaking out, Duffy is reaching out to those people who maybe are suffering on their own.”

“When people in the public eye speak about their experiences it really does help to encourage debate and widen understanding. That’s really important because there is still a lack of understanding and we don’t talk enough about rape and sexual violence.”

Duffy, whose full name is Aimee Duffy, had written that she ”thought the public disclosure of my story would utterly destroy my life, emotionally, while hiding my story was destroying my life so much more”.

The Welsh singer-songwriter had achieved huge success with her 2008 debut album Rockferry and the 2010 follow-up Endlessly, before receding from the public eye after the traumatic incident.

If you’ve been raped or sexually assaulted, you can contact your nearest Rape Crisis organisation for specialist, independent and confidential support: www.rapecrisis.org.uk