Did the Joker rape Batgirl in The Killing Joke?

There’s new speculation that Batgirl was raped by the Joker in Batman: The Killing Joke by Alan Moore. The book climaxes with the Joker shooting and paralyzing Barbara Gordon, the secret identity of Batgirl, unbeknownst to him. He strips her naked before taking photos that he uses to taunt her father, Commissioner Gordon. The panel always featured obscured nudity but originally the center photo showed Batgirl topless as revealed in an inked page tweeted by Bill Hynes, a former employee of Gosh! Comics.

Artist Brian Bolland confirmed on his blog that the page is legitimate.

Here’s a page I drew for “Killing Joke”. I drew what was in the script. That’s my job. I was asked to tone it down a bit. I don’t know how the person who posted it got this image.

Ironically, the censored image is more suggestive. The closeup by it’s very nature is intimate. Furthermore, it leaves us guessing as to what’s happening out of the frame. If she was raped, it would make the recent Joker and Batgirl wedding even more disturbing than it already was.