If this story had broken, at the time it was happening, in Hollywood in the early 60s.
Early 50s?
Oh, that's right, he predates something.
In Hollywood in its heyday, Hollywood in its glamour era, Hollywood with the Sweater Girls and Lana being on top of the world,
would this in fact have been a bigger scandal than the justifiable homicide?
Probably so, probably so, because it was just something that no one ever heard about in those days,
and I'm sure it happened, but no one ever heard about it or ever talked about it.
I knew Lex, and when I first read the book it was kind of hard for me to believe.
Do you believe it?
Well, you know, like the old Baron Munchausen line, was you there Charlie? I wasn't there so long.
Why didn't Lana mention it in her book in 1982?
That's interesting, because that was the one thing I was so afraid of when she told me she was writing her book.
I asked her, I said, what are you going to do about Lex?
And she said, oh, I would never say anything, I wouldn't do that to you.
How did you come to tell your mother back in the 50s that this was happening?
Well, two things happened.
First of all, I had grown up a little in the two years it was going on,
and I met a girl at the boarding school I was in that had been in juvenile hall,
and I asked her some questions about the place,
and I found out that it wasn't what I had been told and it wasn't forever and it wasn't a dungeon and all of that.
And I think that by that time I had matured a little bit enough to realize that he was lying to me about that,
that he was lying to me about everything.
And I went and told my grandmother, who then called my mother,
and my mother came to my grandmother's apartment and I told her.
And at first, I don't think she believed me at first, she was in such shock.
I mean, it's a shocking thing for a mother to hear.
I hear that very often a perverse thing happens when stepfathers rape their stepchildren.
The mother, the natural mother of the kid, gets jealous in a way.
Blames the kid rather than the man.
I don't think that ever happened.
I think there was disbelief, but then she started putting two and two together.
You could see it in her eyes that she was questioning me.
And when she finally, you could see she believed me.
It was a whole change.
You'll tell us about that.
I think the audience's questions, there's nine people up that have questions, very curious,
and I'm sure any reasonable person would be.
Lorraine, if you ever used context with Cheryl,
when your mother realized you were telling the truth, what did she do?
She left me there at my grandmother's, and she went back to our home and she nearly killed him.
Now, I didn't know this until many years later.
What did she do?
He was sleeping, this was quite late at night, she went into the bedroom,
she went into the nightstand and pulled out a gun,
and she stood there with that gun against his head for quite a long time.
And good sense prevailed, and she didn't.
Do you have any proof of biological, physical entry?
Well, I do have an entry in a medical log book she took me to the doctor.
And what he said to my mother was, I can't tell you who's been there,
but someone has, and they did quite a bit of damage.
Do you feel like you were questioned fairly by the police department at that time,
due to what you've been through?
It's not binocular.
Oh, yes. I think they handled it in a professional manner.
Do you think that what he did to you had a great effect on the sexual preference that you choose today?
Good question. Let me just embellish the question.
Here you are raped by your stepfather between the ages of ten and a half and twelve and a half.
You are now, I don't know how you prefer to be styled, lesbian or homosexual, gay person.
Your preference is women.
Did what Barker did to you influence the course your sexual preference took?
I don't believe it did.
Speaking for myself, I believe it was something that was always there.
And long before anything like that happened to me, I feel that my direction was already basically set.
How old do you think you were when you realized that?
Oh, maybe six.
Age six.
I can remember.
You had a preference for women.
I can remember feeling sin. That didn't change, you know, as I grew up.
My question is, who did you talk to during this whole time you were being abused?
Did you talk to anyone telling them what's happening to you?
No. I told no one for two years.
My question is, were you ever envious of your mother or jealous of her?
Did that be a factor in the cause of the killing?
Oh, no. Not at all.
I think that perhaps as a teenager I found it very difficult to be the daughter of one of the most beautiful women in the world.
Well, you're a beautiful girl. I'm a woman now, girl, then.
Thank you.
Did your mother at any time ever accuse you of having an affair with any of the husbands?
No. No, she didn't.
Not even? Barker, not even for a second?
No. No.
Well, how do you feel about the way the incest part was really not told by anyone or the media?
I know back then people just didn't talk about things like that.
I think it's unfortunate. I can't blame anyone for not telling, but I do think it's unfortunate.
When you ran down the stairs to the kitchen, were you aware that you were going down there to get a weapon to defend your mother?
Did you really intend to kill this man?
No. Not at all.
What did you run down to the kitchen for?
As I said, it was in a state of panic. I don't know what I was looking for or what drove me down those stairs.
If there were any...
Three years were so action-packed, Cheryl Crane. We have to move on to what happened to you.
The questioner asked what vehicle you used to maintain your sanity.
In fact, for a time you weren't really that sane. You were put in institutions, you attempted suicide, you went on to drugs and other substance abuse.
What happened if your sexual preference was not affected by the traumas of your childhood? Were those other things, was that acting out from what had happened?
Absolutely. I was carrying so much guilt, guilt from the sexual abuse, guilt from stompin' auto.
What I call my detour years, which was from age 14 to almost 21, was really acting out, punishing myself.
Nobody was making me do all the things that kept getting me in trouble, the runaways, ending up in reform school.
I was doing that. And it takes an adult looking back to realize why I was doing it.
What drugs were you abusing?
Well, when you say drugs today, everybody naturally thinks of all the hard things. They weren't really around then.
I was on prescription drugs, but in those days they were awfully easy to get.
So I was on tranquilizers, I was on sleeping pills, I was on diet pills, I was, you know, there was a pill for every hour of the day.
Why didn't you try and kill yourself?
Because I didn't think very much of myself at that point, and I think that that was the ultimate depression.
I've read your book. I enjoyed it. When you were very young, you mentioned that you didn't have very many playmates, boys or girls.
Was that because of your mother, and does that have any effect on your later life, you think?
What happened was that on the block where we lived, there were not a lot of little kids around, and my mother, I think...
Who were some of the kids you played with?
Well, Liza Minnelli lived next door, and my very, very best friend was Stephanie Wanger, Joan Bennett's daughter, who lived about six blocks away.
But other than seeing the children at other, what they used to call the star baby birthday parties, I really didn't know children until I started school.
Did you resent the fact that your mother used you almost as a prop?