"A secret that she couldn't tell"

The second chapter of “Canary: The Washington Post Investigates,” a new seven-part podcast that follows the intertwining stories of two women who came together after one of them publicly shared her story of sexual assault.

Lauren Clark is a hair stylist in D.C. When a stranger sexually assaulted her in 2013, it sparked a years-long courtroom saga and a campaign for justice. Her story started The Post’s Amy Brittain on a reporting journey that has lasted for nearly three years — one that played out in the middle of a larger cultural reckoning.

When Carole Griffin, a baker in Birmingham, Ala., read The Post’s story about Clark in 2019, it prompted her to reveal an unlikely connection.

In an email to The Post, Griffin said that she had information pertinent to that story. And later, she alleged that a prominent figure in the D.C. criminal justice system had committed a sexual assault decades earlier.

The Post is out now with all the episodes of its first long-form investigative podcast series, called “Canary: The Washington Post Investigates.”