I'm kinda hesitant to admit this, but here we go.

A few years go, in January, I met a young woman off of Craigslist, and we enjoyed a fun evening of drinks, dinner, and some fun in South San Francisco. As the evening wound down, she asked to go back to my hotel (where I was staying at for work). We curled up on the couch for another glass of wine, and as the evening progressed, she passed-the-fuck-out on the couch in my hotel room. I brought a pillow over, put a blanket over her feet and legs, and crawled into bed to catch some sleep myself.

Fast forward to sometime in the following Februrary. I get a phone call, from the hotel that I was staying at, mentioning that they had someone from the South San Francisco Police Department calling and wanting to know my name and information. I gave the hotel clerk the go-ahead to give them my info. When I woke up in the morning, I was greeted with a hand-written "Had a great time, had work early this morning, I'll call you" note next to my glasses.

The policeman called me a few minutes later, giving me the real name of the girl who apparently stayed the night on my couch. She talked about her evening to one of her friends, who insisted that she might have been raped in her drunken state, and to get the police involved completely.

The police performed a rape kit. Interviewed her completely, and then in the process of doing so, discovered that she was a prostitute who would frequent /cas/ whenever she didn't have a client. There were no signs of trauma, and while the police officer was sympathetic, whenever he got down to the gist of my request, they asked for a DNA sample so that they could see if the DNA they collected from her rape kit were mine.

I engaged an attorney, and flew back to San Francisco so that we could all chat together.

As my attorney and I were sitting at the SSFPD's office, getting ready to talk to the attorney, he looked at me and said, "If I tap your foot or kick your chin, you'll know when you need to shut the fuck up."

I explained what went on that night, and hopped online using my laptop to provide him with the food and beverage charges on my credit card from the time period. I offered up text messages and phone calls from the young woman, and my attorney inquired why the detective would want a DNA Sample from me. After some silence of what seemed like forever, the detective in the case mentioned that there was some DNA collected, but, they needed to either match me as a subject, or exclude me as a subject.

The Detective looked at me and said that there was no need for a DNA test, and that he apologized for wasting my time in interviewing me, and proceeded to let my attorney and I leave.

While I'm still not certain to this day what was said during the interview to 'exclude' me as a subject, this memory -- nearly 4 years old at this point in time -- still haunts me today when I'm going out on dates or when I'm in a situation where I could be in a place alone with someone. It's been four plus years since I've let anyone get close enough to me to feel confident enough to let my guard down. My interpersonal relationships have suffered as well -- I no longer want to go out with individuals where I would be alone with someone, just for the fear of being falsely accused again. While no serious criminal charges were ever filed, this has haunted me for a long time.

My days now consist of getting up, cross-fitting or doing strength training, working, eating dinner -- either home or at a restaurant -- and then working on some of my "jobbies" or some other project that I'm working on. While I do need to get some therapy, I've learned to love being alone, and enjoy living my life by myself.

If you find yourself in a similar situation, my advice is to seek legal counsel immediately, and listen to what your attorney says. There is light at the end of the tunnel, and while you might not ever get the vindication that you feel that you deserve, you need to realize that living a happy, healthy, and gratifying life is vindication enough.