[5] During the drive from California to Utah, Duff covertly called journalist and friend Bruce Mirken who then wrote for both the LA Weekly and The Advocate.
[6] Although 30 years her senior, the two nevertheless had had plans to meet for dinner prior to her therapy stay, and upon hearing of her situation, Mirken phoned a public interest legal aid society that secured pro bono services of corporate attorney Gina M. Calabrese of the Los Angeles firm Adams, Duque & Hazeltine.
[5] Although Rivendell was not affiliated with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Duff later said that she was visited by Mormon missionaries during her six months at the Utah psychiatric facility and that the treatment she received was heavily influenced by religion.
[12][19][20] From 1992 through 1998, Duff was an outspoken critic of the mental health system, appearing on CNN, ABC's 20/20, and numerous print, radio and television media outlets.
During these same years, Duff was emerging as a journalist in her own right, writing for Youth Outlook, a column in The San Francisco Examiner, and Pacific News Service.
[32] In early 2000 she began to cover religious affairs from her posting in Jerusalem, writing widely on the problems and conflicts between Christians, Jews, and Muslims.
[33] In February 2004, Duff, who was then living six months out of every year in Jerusalem, was home in the United States on a brief visit when a group of ex-soldiers overthrew the democratically elected government of Haiti.
[34] During 2004–2006, Duff regularly covered the situation in Haiti for San Francisco Bay View, Pacifica Radio's Flashpoints, and Pacific News Service.
Subjects have included politically motivated mass rape,[35] the United Nations mission in Haiti, killings by American Marines in Port-au-Prince,[36] civilians taking over the neighborhood of Bel Air[37] and murders of street children by police and ex-soldiers.
A 2 September 2006 article Kolbe and Hutson wrote for The Lancet, "Human rights abuse and other criminal violations in Port-au-Prince, Haiti: a random survey of households", based on the study faced criticism for being too supportive of president Jean-Bertrand Aristide and also for citing two articles written by Duff without disclosing that Duff and Kolbe were the same person.
[39][40] Kolbe earned a PhD from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor in 2015; her dissertation was titled "Reintegrating members of armed groups into Haitian society: An evaluation of three approaches".