Lawsuit: Police accused woman of making up rape claim about serial rapist

A woman in Lynnwood, Washington has sued several police and city officials after she was accused of lying about being raped, according to Courthouse News Service.

The man she accused of raping her, Marc Patrick O'Leary, was later sentenced to more than 300 years in prison in 2011.

In 2008, when the women was 18, she reported that O'Leary had tied her up and assaulted her. Police found physical evidence that supported her story, and doctors documented abrasions on her wrists and vagina.

However, the detectives accused her of fabricating the incident because of "inconsistencies" in her account of the crime. The detectives forced her to confess to making up the story, according to the lawsuit, and charged her with filing a false police report. The charge against her was later dropped.

Three years later, O'Leary was arrested and federal agents uncovered hundreds of photos of his victims, including the woman accused of filing a false report.

"The fact that she went a couple years with nobody believing her is horrible," Steve Rider of the Lynnwood Police Department said in 2011.

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[Woman covering face with her arms via Shutterstock]