"After 11 Years, I Uncovered the Truth: My Attacker Was Someone I Knew, All While My Kids Slept Just Steps Away"

DONNA Palomba was exhausted after taking her children out to a concert, so went to bed as soon as they got home.

The 36-year-old was home alone with her kids as her husband, John, was away at a friend’s wedding. It was the first time they had spent a night apart since they tied the knot 12 years earlier.

Donna Palomba was asleep at home when she noticed a masked figure in her bedroomCredit: NBC It took her 11 years to find out who the attacker wasCredit: Supplied

John had left for the wedding on Wednesday while Donna stayed at home due to work, she was a marketing executive at the time.

She recalled that John felt bad for leaving and said: “He was a little concerned, but I assured him we would be fine.”

It was Friday, September 10, 1993, and after a busy day with the kids, aged five and seven at the time, Donna went to bed.

In the middle of the night Donna, who lived in a sleepy town in Connecticut, heard footsteps along her hallway and remembers thinking it didn’t sound like children’s bare feet.

Sleeping on her stomach, Donna turned to face the door to see a large male figure with a face covering on.

“As soon as I was coming out of , I realised that something was terribly wrong,” she told Dateline .

Before Donna could even react, the man was on top of her, he covered her head with a pillowcase, blindfolded her, and tied her hands behind her back with a pair of tights.

“I couldn’t resist at that point because I was bound, so I just remember him cutting my clothing while I was still on my stomach and then he flipped me over and he raped me,” she told Oxygen .

As Donna lay helpless, the man then pulled a gun out.

He put a gun in her mouth, then placed it to her temple before flipping her onto her stomach and pushing the gun into her back.

He warned Donna that he would come back to kill her if she went to the , before slipping out of the house.

John and Donna Palomba were devastated when they found out it was a close friendCredit: Dateline/NBC

She was able to get out of her bindings and rush to her children, still asleep in their beds.

Despite his warning, Donna went to call the police but realised her phone lines had been cut and rushed to a neighbour’s house.

“My children are ok but they’re in the house by themselves,” a panicked Donna told the 911 dispatcher. “They’re seven and five. Please, I don’t want to leave them alone – what should I do?”

Her neighbour grabbed an axe and ran to Donna’s house to stand guard until police arrived.

Donna also called her husband’s brother, who came to look after the kids while she went to hospital for an examination, when from the attacker was collected.

But Donna was adamant that nobody should call her husband as she didn’t want to ‘frighten him.’

Donna broke the news in person the next day when John arrived home.

“I remember him flying out of the room and just saying, ‘No!’ and ‘How could this happen?’ It was his worst nightmare,” Donna explains.

She thought the worst was over, but one month after reporting the rape to police, Donna was treated like a suspect.

Police believed that Donna had lied about the event and threatened to arrest her.

The ‘evidence’ they had was town gossip from an informant that claimed Donna was having an affair and that she had made up the rape account after one of her children walked in on her with a lover that night.

It was a rumour that Donna staunchly denied, and she and John later sued the Waterbury Police Department, eight years after her assault took place.

During this time, Donna had been diagnosed with and still was no closer to finding who her rapist was.

By then, the case had been transferred to Neil O’Leary, a Waterbury Police detective who went on to become police chief, and he believed Donna from the get-go.

CLOSE TIES

John and Donna came to the realisation the rapist must have been somebody they knew, as there was no forced entry to the house and they believed the attacker knew John was out of town for the wedding.

Donna says: “I had no idea who he was, where he was. I didn’t know if he was someone from my life, my personal life, or my social life, but I did know that he was someone that knew me.

“And that was the most frightening part.”

The case had gone cold, but in 2004, Detective O’Leary had a hunch Donna’s attacker was a man called John Regan.

He was close friends with Donna’s husband, who said: “If I were to name like 10 friends that were closest to me, he probably would have made that list, that’s how well we knew each other.”

At the time of Donna’s attack, Regan’s cousin had a stag do near the Palomba family home, meaning he was in the area.

It was unbelievable to think that this person that we had known could do such a thing.

Donna Palomba

The connection came after Regan was accused of sexually assaulting a 21-year-old woman who worked below him at a local roofing company, who was able to break free and flee.

When Regan was charged with the unlawful restraint of his colleague, Detective O’Leary asked for and received a voluntary DNA sample from him.

When the results came back, it confirmed his DNA was found at the scene where Donna was attacked.

The couple were stunned by the results, heartbroken that it was someone they trusted, and relieved he was finally caught.

They recalled that a few years after the rape, they even spent the day with Regan at the beach with other friends.

“It was unbelievable to think that this person that we had known could do such a thing,” Donna said.

In October 2004, Regan was charged with kidnapping Donna. By then, the statute of limitations for a rape charge had run out. He pleaded not guilty to the kidnapping and was let out on bail.

Then in 2005, Regan tried to abduct a cross-country runner, Lindsey Ferguson, from her high school car park in .

A coach from her school heard her scream and she was able to escape, while Regan was caught and arrested.

Police found two slip knots, tarp, a syringe and antihistamine medication known to cause drowsiness in his van.

Regan was sentenced to 12 years for this kidnapping, and another 15 for Donna and his 2004 victim.

Donna now helps other victims tell their story and overcome traumaCredit: Supplied

MOVING ON

In 2017, Regan qualified for early release but in 2021, he was ordered to live in a mental health facility or approved housing with strict supervision until a judge ordered otherwise.

Donna has spent much of her life focused on helping other victims of sexual assault.

She runs the charity Jane Doe No More , which aims to empower and bring hope to survivors of sexual crimes.

“I hope that it gives courage to other women to know that if you’re a victim of rape, you did nothing wrong, you can persevere,” she says.

“And you can even have a wonderful life.”