As singer Duffy is seen for the first time in 10 years, what happened to her in kidnapping and rape ordeal?

Duffy has appeared in public for the first time in 10 years after she was seen lip syncing to her song Mercy on TikTok and fans couldn’t contain their delight. One fan said:”Duffy! Where have you been?!” whilst another wrote:”So good that she’s back.”

Singer Duffy did briefly return to social media in 2024 when she shared a motivational video to her Instagram followers, the caption for the video read: "A little something to motivate the heart. Hope you are all doing well. Lots of love, Duffy."

The voiceover for the video said: “One day you’re going to see it, that happiness was always about the discovery, the hope, the listening to your heart and following it wherever it chose to go." The voiceover also said: “Happiness was always about being kinder to yourself. It was always about embracing the person you are becoming. One day you will understand that happiness was always about learning how to live with yourself."

What happened to Duffy in kidnapping and rape ordeal?

In a written account on a website called duffywords.com singer Duffy whose real name is Aimée Anne Duffy, explains what happened to her and starts by saying that “If you are reading this, I must warn you it contains information some may find upsetting. This story is not going anywhere, it will remain online, if you are not able to take on someone else’s suffering or the recounting of such, I recommend you do not read on.”

Duffy then goes on to say that “I posted the words I wrote, a few weeks ago, because I was tired of hiding. Never feeling free or burden free. I had become enmeshed with my story like a dark secret. It made me alone and feel alone.

“What is also hard to explain is that, in hiding, in not talking, I was allowing the rape to become a companion. Me and it living in my being, I no longer wanted to feel that intimacy with it, a decade of that intimacy has been destructive. I had to set myself free. I have been hurt and it would have been dangerous to talk from that hurt place in the past, prior to feeling ready.

“Unable to do what I am doing today, previously, I also considered and explored human rights laws to change my name off public record and disappear to another country and maybe become a florist or something, so that I could put the past behind with a new life.

Duffy also wrote on the website that “Rape stripped me of my human rights, to experience a life with autonomy from fear. It has already stolen one third of my life. Deep down I do know it would have been a shame and done such an immense disservice, to my existence, to just delete myself and forget what I had experienced in music publicly.

“It was also not just my burden, so many others lived with the big question too of “what happened”. The record label, live agents, promoters, publicists, musicians, stylists, hairdressers, make-up, lighting, production, crew, people I would meet, people I once knew. No one, utterly no one, knew what happened. It kept me removed from those I could actually trust. Mostly I did not want to trouble anyone else with what I had experienced.”

Duffy then explained what happened to her and wrote: “It was my birthday, I was drugged at a restaurant, I was drugged then for four weeks and travelled to a foreign country. I can’t remember getting on the plane and came round in the back of a travelling vehicle. I was put into a hotel room and the perpetrator returned and raped me.

“I remember the pain and trying to stay conscious in the room after it happened. I was stuck with him for another day, he didn’t look at me, I was to walk behind him, I was somewhat conscious and withdrawn. I could have been disposed of by him.

“I contemplated running away to the neighbouring city or town, as he slept, but had no cash and I was afraid he would call the police on me, for running away, and maybe they would track me down as a missing person. I do not know how I had the strength to endure those days, I did feel the presence of something that helped me stay alive.

“I flew back with him, I stayed calm and as normal as someone could in a situation like that, and when I got home, I sat, dazed, like a zombie. I knew my life was in immediate danger, he made veiled confessions of wanting to kill me. With what little strength I had, my instinct was to then run, to run and find somewhere to live that he could not find.”

Duffy also revealed that "It didn't feel safe to go to the police,” and said: “I felt if anything went wrong, I would be dead, and he would have killed me. I could not risk being mishandled or it being all over the news during my danger.”

She ended her story with these words: “I ask myself now, as I write this … what makes me feel more beautiful, more hopeful and more at peace? So, if I do indeed press SEND and put this online, I hope it brings me the smile in my eyes, the light in my life, that has been absent for just so long.

I can now leave this decade behind. Where the past belongs. Hopefully no more “what happened to Duffy" questions, now you know… and I am free.”

Anyone who has been victim of rape, sexual assaul or any form of sexual abuse – whether recent or non-recent – is asked to contact police . Information about sexual abuse support services can be found on the NHS website. If you are experiencing domestic abuse, you can also ring the freephone, 24-hour National Domestic Abuse Helpline on 0808 2000 247.