Real Criminal Case - Defending the Falsely Accused

Day 2 of the preliminary hearing....The silence hung in the air. The judge, attorneys, defendants, and audience waited for the alleged victim’s answer. Her voice trembled as she said, “I don’t remember that video.” The defense attorney said, “There are 7 innocent lives at stake because of what you said. Will you admit that you’re not telling the truth?” The victim broke down in tears: “I don’t know.” She was denying something that was clear - the sexual contact was consensual - the Perry Mason moment during cross examination exposed her as a liar. She had previously admitted not wanting to be in trouble at home, and with the police, for being a habitual runaway before claiming rape. She had a motive to make up the story but the prosecutor never investigated it.

The events leading up to formal charges in court began in late 2016, when the alleged victim met one of the defendants via Instagram. The two communicated using Instagram’s direct message function and eventually made plans to spend time together. They had sex several times and kept in contact through Instagram, with the victim following several of the defendant’s friends on her account. Through numerous group messages, comments, live videos, and personal chats, they eventually made plans to see each other and party in early March. On a Friday that month, defendant picked her with two of her friends on a street corner near her house. He took them to his friend’s house, where a small party was going on. They drank alcohol and smoked marijuana, enjoying their Friday night. When the victim’s friends left the house, she chose to stay, so that she could spend time with the boys at the house. A week later, the victim filed a police report alleging that the seven boys who had been at the house kidnapped, raped, and repeatedly took advantage of her throughout the weekend. They were interrogated, arrested, and put in custody - all were under 21 years old and denied the rape claim. As a result of her claims, several defendants were facing life sentences.

After my firm was hired to defend one of the accused, our investigation obtained social media evidence from the alleged victim. She had posted numerous times about engaging in sexual conduct with multiple people and shared nude photos with her followers. Our investigation also established significant discrepancies between her story in the original police report and other evidence. For example, a video taken inside Walgreens, where the victim and one of the defendants went to buy alcohol, made it clear that she was not being held against her will. Instead, she was walking casually, laughing, and seemingly enjoying her time with the defendant.

Just prior to the preliminary hearing, the defense team came into possession of a video establishing the accuser was lying. In this video, she is seen engaging in consensual group sex with the defendants. It is very clear that she is not being raped or held against her will. Seeing the video, she began to change her story yet she refused to admit she made the whole thing up. On the final day of the preliminary hearing, all forcible charges were reduced, and the defendants were released. Instead of being convicted of kidnapping, rape, and sexual abuse, our client was able to go free after entering a no contest plea to a misdemeanor sentence (she was 15 and he was 19 at the time of their sexual encounter).

This case demonstrated that defending false charges is especially difficult, if the prosecutor and police have not fully examined the evidence in the case and accept what an under-age accuser says without a critical review. False claims take away from the real victims and undermine the fairness of the entire judicial process as the young men could not bail out and sat in Los Angeles County Jail for many months before winning release.