(CNSNews.com) – “I’m doing really well. I feel like a weight’s been lifted,” Leigh Corfman, one of Judge Roy Moore’s accusers, told NBC’s “Today” show on Monday. “I’ve had a lot of people come out and say that because of my courage, that they’re able to do the same.”
Corfman described once again how Moore, then 32 years old, “proceeded to seduce me” decades ago. She was 14 at the time and had snuck out of her mother’s house to go with Moore to his house.
“I was a 14-year-old child trying to play in an adult’s world, and he was 32 years old,” Corfman said.
She said it did not occur to her at the time that she had been molested, but she said the experience did change her life for the worse:
“I’d been reading Harlequin romances, you know, for years at that point, and I was expecting candlelight and roses, and what I got was very different.
“It took away a lot of the specialness of, you know, interactions with men. It took some trust away. It allowed me to delve into some things that I, you know, wouldn’t have otherwise. It took years for me to regain a sense of confidence in myself. And I felt guilty,” she said. “You know, I felt like I was the one to blame. And it was decades before I was able to let that go.”
Corfman said her family and friends knew what had happened to her as a 14-year-old because she “spent a lot of time…railing” against Moore every time his name came up.
She said as a single parent with small children, she decided not to confront Moore, although she wanted to and almost did in 2000 or 2001. “And when you’re in that situation, you do everything you can to protect your own.”
Corfman said she did discuss her experience in general terms with her children when they were in elementary school and junior high school, but “they were afraid that with all their social connections, that they would be castigated in their groups,” so they “decided together” that Corfman would not go public at that time.
She said the Washington Post sought her out, and she told the reporter (who was “wonderful to me”) that “if they found additional people, that I will tell my story. And they found those additional people.”
Corfman told NBC’s Savannah Guthrie she was not paid or compensated in any way for coming forward: “If anything, this has cost me. I have no tickets to Tahiti. And my bank account has not flourished. If anything it has gone down.”
Corfman said she was sorry to hear what other accusers have gone through. “But here’s the beauty of what has happened. The support has been amazing. Women and men have come forward to tell their stories…because of my courageous actions.”
Shown a photo of her 14-year-old self, Corfman said, “She sure did have a lot of promise ahead of her. And she didn’t deserve to have a 32-year-old man prey upon her.”
Corfman denied any political motivation, saying she’s voted Republican for years. “But this isn’t political for me. This is personal.”
Moore has denied the sexual abuse allegations against him made by nine women, and he has firmly refused calls to drop out of the U.S. Senate race in Alabama.
(First reported by CNS News) https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/susan-jones/leigh-corfman-roy-moores-accuser-i-was-expecting-candlelight-and-roses (November 22, 2017)
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