Take the case of Heathcliff Berru, an indie-music publicist who’s now alleged to have made unwanted attempts at a number of women over the last few years. This week, Amber Coffman of the band Dirty Projectors recounted on Twitter how Berru groped her and bit her hair at a bar. Soon other testimonials flooded in from women in bands, at PR firms, and elsewhere in the rock scene. Some said that Berru or one of his friends roofied them. Others told stories that amounted to him attempting rape.

Berru has now resigned from Life or Death PR, the firm he cofounded and that has represented a number of high-profile artists including D’Angelo, Frank Ocean, GZA, Cloud Nothings, Killer Mike, and Wavves, many of whom quickly severed ties with the company. In a statement, Berru blamed his actions of alcohol and drugs, said he’d go to rehab, apologized to any women he “offended,” and included a line so deadpan and strange that it might be a passive-aggressive joke: “It’s time to put a stop to all of this. Create a world with one less inappropriate man.” Regardless of his sincerity and of whether it’s okay to chalk up a pattern of sexual assault to partying too hard, it does appear he has lost his career and reputation for now.

The scandal has caused some soul-searching among members of the indie-music world. It appears that lots of people knew about or had heard about Berru regularly trying to take advantage of women, but that there had been no consequences till now. So, according to the allegations, he had, yes, acted with impunity. “Everyone is all, ‘I knew he was a creep but wow,’” tweeted Judy Miller Silverman, another well-known indie publicist. “You know, you still hired him and you still supported him. And some of you worked for him.”

The motif of silence and complicity is common when it comes to harassment and assault in rock. In a horrifying Vice piece last October, Rachel Grace Almeida gathered up a slew of stories from women in the industry, many of which resemble the ones that have surfaced about Berru. They range from intimate and personal—about, say, a guy whose abused girlfriend didn’t speak up because he was friends with her bandmates—to higher-up: a boss making advances toward a younger female employee. None of the women or men in the article were referred to by their real names. At the end, Almeida offered a prescription for how to change things:

As it stands, there is one thing that can be done to help prevent this: a deconstruction of the fear of powerful men. Stories need to be told and people need to be called out if someone has destroyed another person’s life. A man having a big job at a festival shouldn’t take priority over the emotional and mental stability of another human.

Coffman has now proven the efficacy of this idea. She called Berru out. Other women followed. For now, it appears, he has faced consequences. Maybe that will be a warning to other men.