Woman who alleges rape by Danny Masterson delivers emotional testimony over four days
Masterson, 35, who has been accused of rape, attempted rape and sexual battery, is scheduled to stand trial later this year, accused of multiple rapes in the late 1990s after he was fired from his job as a stripper. He has denied any wrongdoing.
His attorney, Mark Geragos, has asked Judge Elizabeth Brown to allow him to stand for a bond hearing on Wednesday. Brown called the defendant’s appearance on a criminal charge “unacceptable” and said she had made “an initial ruling that he would continue to be released on bond.”
Brown has scheduled another hearing Sept. 23 regarding Masterson’s bail.
In her testimony Tuesday, Mireya Arroyo, 20, said she was a college student when the alleged attack occurred over the summer of 1999. She recounted how Masterson took her to his apartment and raped her.
Afterward, she said, Masterson forced himself on her, took her to a back room, stripped naked and raped her again. At one point, she said, Masterson tried to choke her.
On Tuesday, a courtroom was filled with the weeping faces of the young women testifying about their sexual encounters with Masterson. They spoke of their fears that they would be ridiculed if their claims of abuse were believed.
“I told him, ‘I am a woman.’ I thought about my family, my boyfriend. I was so afraid he would try to go to them,” said Arroyo, 24. “He said, ‘I am a man.’ And that’s when I knew that he was different.”
The second time Masterson allegedly sexually assaulted Arroyo, she said, he took her inside the bedroom, tied her to a bedpost and threatened to kill her if she tried to get up. As she cried and begged him to stop, Masterson’s attorney, Mark Geragos, entered the room and the sexual activity stopped.
Judge Elizabeth Brown called Arroyo’s testimony “credible” but also noted the “lack of physical evidence of any sexual contact.”
“This is not a case of a man