FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Shortly after the “Pillowcase Rapist” suspect was arrested in Miami-Dade County in January 2020, a Broward County woman spoke to a detective.
The Broward detective asked Catherine whether she was happy the man she thinks attacked her, the so-called Pillowcase Rapist suspect identified as Robert Eugene Koehler, was in jail and might be there for the rest of his life.
“I’m really happy that he’s going to go to jail,” Catherine said. “I hope he’s treated really badly. I want everything horrible that could possibly happen to a human being to happen to this guy.”
She also hopes other survivors, as they are called, come forward.
“I hope people don’t feel like they have to be brave, or say everything,” said Catherine, who now lives in New Jersey and asked to be identified only with a first name. “Just say ‘I was one,’ so the count is known, so the extent of how evil this guy is is known.”
Officials think there could be more than 40 survivors in South Florida. The Broward Sheriff’s Office, with help from the Nancy J. Cotterman Center, recently issued six arrest warrants for Koehler, who is being held in a Miami jail on two charges from a sexual battery case. In 2020, the Miami-Dade State Attorney Office said DNA evidence linked Koehler to at least 25 unsolved cases from the 1980s. But the evidence could be tough to acquire in those cases.
The Pillowcase Rapist, called that because he’d often cover his victim’s face with a pillowcase (as well as cover his own face with a shirt or something similar), is suspected of a reign of terror from Deerfield Beach to South Miami between May 1981 and February 1986.
Although Catherine’s assault happened in 1984, cases such as hers could still be prosecuted because the Cotterman Center, located in downtown Fort Lauderdale and the only certified sexual assault program for Broward County, preserved evidence and medical reports, as it always does.
“What happened specifically in this case,” said Ana Maria Ferrer, human services administrator for the Cotterman Center, “is with some advances in DNA testing technology, they were able to retest the evidence that was collected here, and then certain matches and hits came up with that evidence.”
Catherine has many reasons for hoping others come forward, including how it could help the survivors.
“For me it’s really a matter of partly getting justice, partly making this monster know that he can’t get away with this,” she said.
“It’s like, you didn’t do anything wrong — this guy did something terrible. He needs to be really punished for what he’s done. And you don’t need to hide; you don’t need to be ashamed,” Catherine said. “That’s what makes me sad, if people feel like this is a dark, ugly secret they have to keep all their life.”
Catherine suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder due to her assault, and she said the effects have been dramatic and lasting.
Because he held a sharp object to her throat, Catherine was afraid to have a block of knives in her house for years. Because he stole money from her, she was afraid to have money in her house because she thought it’d lead to another rape and robbery.
Even now, almost 40 years after the attack, she still experiences triggers that bring on anxiety. And she sometimes can’t help thinking the long recovery process has been her fault somehow because she wasn’t tougher or because it’s been harder to cope than she thought.
“I would have liked to have more of the life that I thought I was going to have instead of the one I got,” she said.
The Cotterman Center could help in that aspect, too, because it offers ongoing counseling to sexual assault survivors.
“It doesn’t only happen to women,” Ferrer said. “It happens to men, as well.”
The Cotterman Center opened in 1977 and is moving to a bigger location in Oakland Park next year. It serves sexual abuse and child abuse victims in a confidential manner. It has 57 full-time employees who can speak English, Spanish, Creole and Portuguese, and it’s always staffed, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
“In one year we will potentially see between 3,000 and 4,000 individuals,” Ferrer said. “But that includes not only sexual violence, that includes child abuse.”
In sexual abuse cases, survivors are often brought to the Cotterman Center by law enforcement for a physical exam and medical report.
“We have seen babies, and we have seen the elderly being assaulted,” Ferrer said. “We work with the whole age range.”
The Cotterman Center conducts a full examination and uses a Sexual Assault Evidence Collection kit to gather semen or other evidence, examine clothing, and document injuries. The evidence is placed in a collection bag, which is sealed. In many cases the medical report that accompanies the physical evidence is key. Law enforcement offices, such as the Broward Sheriff’s Office, take possession of the bag and the Cotterman Center keeps a copy of the medical report, which might be required at a later date.
“Part of the process is that once they collect it, they also serve as expert witnesses,” Ferrer said, “so they go to court and they present their findings, their medical report. They also serve as expert witnesses in the criminal prosecution cases.”
Although it’s not cheerful work, it’s sometimes gratifying.
“What we find here is we’re able to help survivors through the most vulnerable time in their life, help them through that process,” Ferrer said.
Catherine hopes other survivors hear that message and take action.
“As I say, I want people to come forward,” she said. “I want him to be charged with every single criminal act he’s done.”
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