LOS ANGELES (AP) — Five months after a deadlocked jury led to a mistrial for actor Danny Masterson, the former star of “That ’70s Show” is on trial again in a…
Five months after a deadlocked jury led to a mistrial for actor Danny Masterson, the former star of “That ’70s Show” is on trial again in a Los Angeles court. Masterson is accused of raping three women between 2001 and 2003. He could get 45 years in prison if convicted.
Here are the key elements, characters and issues that will factor into the retrial.
DIRECT DISCUSSION OF DRUGGING
A judge is now allowing the prosecution to say directly that Masterson drugged all three women before raping them, in what may be the biggest difference from the first trial. Previously, the drugging could only be implied when the women testified to feeling disoriented, losing memory and going unconscious to a degree that could not be explained by the alcohol they had consumed.
In opening statements Monday, Deputy District Attorney Reinhold Mueller said all three women had consumed drinks Masterson had given them, and that the “evidence will show that they were drugged.” The defense says there is no such evidence beyond the women’s stories. And defense attorney Philip Cohen made clear to jurors that ”there is no drugging charge.”
NEW ROLE FOR SCIENTOLOGY
The Church of Scientology loomed large at Masterson’s trial. It could loom larger still in his retrial, with Judge Charlaine Olmedo allowing expert testimony on Scientology that she denied the first time.
Masterson is a prominent member of the church. All three of his accusers are former members who grew disillusioned with the institution in the aftermath of their alleged assaults, saying that church officials told them what had happened to them was not rape, and that its policies prevented them from going to police. The church vehemently denied having any such policy.
The two opposing experts set to testify embody the stark cultural divides the church sometimes creates. The prosecution’s expert, Claire Headley, is a former official in Scientology’s leadership group, known as the Sea Org, who became a staunch church foe, suing it in 2009 over her experience.
