Los Angeles Times

By detailing the horrific events of her gang rape, one woman fights to end sexual violence on college campuses

LOS ANGELES - The buzz of the lights. That is all you can hear in this big gymnasium, the buzz of the lights overhead and the sound of Brenda Tracy's voice, which remains steady even as she begins to cry.

Her gaze shifts to the floor, if only for a moment. Standing alone on an empty basketball court, she straightens up and looks at the hundreds of people watching from the stands.

Dressed in a black T-shirt and jeans, Tracy resumes telling them about the night so long ago when she stopped by a friend's apartment. She recalls the football players who were there, how they persuaded her to have a drink, how she passed out a short time later.

"The first time I regained consciousness, I became immediately aware I was laying on my back on the floor," she says. "I was naked and I couldn't move my arms or legs."

The man on her left tried to force her to have oral sex. So did the man on her right.

"So I turned from them and looked up and the third man was raping me," she says. "And I remember feeling like I was trying to say or yell 'Stop.'"

Twenty years later, this is what the 45-year-old mother of two does, traveling the country to stand before strangers and share her most awful memory. She has appeared before 110,000 fans at Michigan's football stadium and 15 or so players on a basketball team. This crusade, which started years before the #MeToo movement, takes her any place where people will listen.

On this night, at

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