CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The knock on the door came in August.

But Allyssa Allison didn't quite trust the investigator standing on the other side of the door. It had been too long. Too many detectives, some who she felt didn't listen. Once again, she was on guard.

But she took Nicole DiSanto's card. And she soon called the number.

DiSanto told her she wanted to talk about her being a victim in 1993, the year she was raped.

"We have something called a hit in your case," Allison remembers DiSanto, an investigator for the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's office, telling her.

Allison said she started crying. She felt like it might be a prank or a mistake.

And then there was her next thought. Is he still out there?

Allison, a 49-year-old mother of three, is one of hundreds of Cleveland-area women getting similar knocks on the door and phone calls about rapes they reported in the past 20 years. Some are grateful to have their cases re-opened. Many say they've been looking over their shoulders for years. Others have moved on into new lives – and lifestyles -- and would prefer not to open old wounds.

Allison is also one of a pool of rape survivors – less than 10 at this point – whose cases are reopened only to find out the suspected attacker is dead.

That group is likely to grow as thousands of decades-old rape kits from Cuyahoga County are tested and results get sent back to investigators and police departments for follow up.

Assistant County Prosecutor Brian McDonough, who leads the DNA Cold Case project, said county investigators try to notify every victim that their rapist has been identified – even if prosecution is no longer possible. McDonough said his office also offers victims information on where to get counseling to help them process the information.

"We believe we can give them as survivors some peace of mind and some comfort," McDonough said.

One victim, he said, recently told him for decades she had been looking over her shoulder. When told her attacker was dead, "She was overjoyed."

Allison was one of the women who tried to move on. But for 20 years since being raped, she always was cautious, suspicious and paranoid about her interactions with people.

The knock on the door released an avalanche of memories, details and thoughts.

The pillowcase her rapist used to shield his face. The nasty things he said in his disguised voice. How he made her chug vodka and tried to drug her before relentlessly raping her.

But what bothered her most – and what she told investigators – was that she knew who attacked her. She had for years.

The night she was raped, before going to the hospital, Allison said more than 10 officers asked her questions. She just wanted medical attention.

But she said she later told detectives her suspicions. Her apartment wasn't broken into. The rapist had entered through a bathroom window with a busted lock. There was only one person who knew it needed fixed.

"I always thought it was my landlord," she said. "I had no proof but there were so many things that pointed to him," she said. He knew things about her. He lived right next door.

"I told the police what I thought," she said. Allison said she was told the man had an alibi.

But she wanted to be taken seriously. She wrote letters to then-Cleveland Mayor Michael White and her councilman, Jim Rokakis. She talked to television reporter Tom Beres about the case, hoping for action.

For a while she said her assigned sex crimes detective was responsive and listened to her. But then he retired.

"After awhile I would just call sex crimes and leave messages and nobody would call back," she said. "I kind of gave up."

Allison said she got counseling. It helped. As part of her therapy she wrote a raw poem about how she felt.

Part of it reads, "Now her body is afraid and she's so cold. She'll never forget even as she grows old."

She didn't.

When the knock on the door came in August, it was hard to trust that it would be different this time.

After Allison spoke with investigators, telling her story once again, she didn't hear back for a while, probably more than a month.

"The limbo was really hard," she said. "I kept thinking I would be let down again."

But then she got another call.

"Nicole (DiSanto) called and she said, 'Well, guess what? You were right. It was him.'"

DiSanto had gathered a DNA swab from a relative of her former landlord. It was compared to the DNA profile found in Allison's 1993 rape kit.

The attacker was also a likely match to at least three other rape cases reported after Allison's – including one reported by a woman who later lived in the same apartment complex where Allison had lived.

Those cases, which varied widely in the way they were described, all happened between 1993 and 1995 – though kits from after that time may not be fully tested yet, meaning more matches could be found.

In one case, a woman told police she was dragged into a car, driven to a home and raped. She fled after the rapist fell asleep. Police returned to the home and arrested him but he was "straight released" from jail after the victim didn't keep an appointment for an additional interview, according to police records.

In another case, a woman who had been recently hospitalized reported that she accepted a ride home from a man and was raped. Records in that case indicate the woman was suffering from some mental health issues.

Freddie "Lucky" Brown Jr., Allison's former landlord, had died in 2005 at the age of 53.

A look back at his criminal record shows no sex crimes convictions, though he was arrested in 1987 on rape and kidnapping charges that were later dismissed.

The news brought about mixed emotions for Allison.

"It made it so much harder. I'll never get my day in court. I'll never be able to tell him off."

She did what felt like the next best thing. She printed out a photo from his online obituary and punched it again and again.

Still, she wants something more.

A piece of paper, something concrete, proving that he raped her.

That is difficult because he will never be officially charged -- or convicted -- of any of the rapes.

Investigators had to identify the DNA in Allison's and other rape kits based on comparison to DNA voluntarily provided by a family member. Investigators say the family member did the right thing in a very difficult situation -- which also caused emotional strife.

Allison said she feels for her attacker's family. She knows his children don't deserve to shoulder his burdens.

But the women he raped, they deserve something, too.

There is one feeling Allison is left with that's worth holding onto – despite the 20 years worth of worry and frustrations.

"It feels so good not be afraid any more, you have no idea what it's like to be afraid every day for 20 years," Allison said. "Now I'm not."