A non-public fairness government turned his New York Metropolis condo right into a torture chamber of “grotesque sexual violence,” Manhattan prosecutors stated Thursday.
The 43-year-old is accused of raping six ladies over 5 months in a wicked rampage wherein he punched, waterboarded and shocked victims with a cattle prod and saved recordings of the assaults as trophies.
Ryan Hemphill, who stays jailed after his arrest final month, pleaded not responsible to a 116-count indictment charging him with predatory sexual assault and different crimes courting to final October. Hemphill, who can be a lawyer, threatened to have victims arrested or disappeared in a bid to maintain them silent, prosecutors stated.
“The defendant told these survivors that he was untouchable,” Manhattan District Legal professional Alvin Bragg stated. “The indictment makes clear that he was wrong.”
Hemphill sat quietly in a khaki jail swimsuit, his cuffed fingers clutching a cross behind his again, as a prosecutor described his alleged crimes in grotesque element.
If convicted, Hemphill may spend the remainder of his life in jail. He was beforehand acquitted in 2015 of choking and holding a knife to his ex-girlfriend’s throat after testifying that he loved strangling her throughout intercourse.
“We have reason to believe these six victims are only the tip of the iceberg,” Manhattan Assistant District Legal professional Mirah Curzer advised Choose Ann E. Scherzer.
Hemphill’s condo, close to the Empire State Constructing, was outfitted with quite a few surveillance cameras, and investigators have recovered photos exhibiting dozens, if not tons of, of different ladies, a lot of them bare and blindfolded, Curzer stated.
Investigators additionally discovered tons of of bullets and high-capacity magazines, and a considerable amount of medication, together with heroin, cocaine, amphetamines, and fentanyl, prosecutors stated.
Hemphill met the six ladies by web sites, together with some focusing on “sugar daddy” preparations for girls in search of rich romantic companions, Curzer stated.
He advised the ladies he was into position play and dominance and supplied them massive sums of cash in trade for intercourse and companionship, although he ended up not paying among the ladies or giving them pretend money as an alternative, Curzer stated.
As Hemphill received to know the ladies, he satisfied them to confide their previous sexual traumas, which he then intentionally reenacted as he assaulted them, Curzer stated. He took benefit of some victims’ inexperience, the prosecutor stated, or crossed boundaries that victims had clearly articulated.
Hemphill is accused of tricking victims into ingesting substances that rendered them unable to battle again, utilizing handcuffs and different restraints on them, wrapping their heads and faces with duct tape, slapping and punching them, and torturing them with a cattle prod and shock collar.
Hemphill saved one sufferer shackled to a mattress for hours whereas she begged him to let her go, Curzer stated.
Hemphill’s alleged conduct is “truly shocking to the conscience,” and he “has made clear that he has no regard for the law or the courts,” Curzer stated.
To maintain ladies quiet, Hemphill boasted about connections to legislation enforcement and arranged crime, prosecutors stated, and claimed that as a result of the ladies had accepted gives of cash, it was them who can be arrested.
Hemphill is charged with bribing a witness and, in accordance with prosecutors, drew up a contract wherein he agreed to pay a lady $2,000 in trade for dropping a criticism she filed with police. He’s additionally accused of forcing some victims to report movies wherein they acknowledged that that they had consented to being abused.
“The power imbalance in his predatory acts could not be more clear,” Bragg advised reporters. “He wielded his law degree and money as both sword and shield, coercing and silencing survivors.”
The arraignment occurred down the corridor from disgraced film mogul Harvey Weinstein’s rape retrial.
Scherzer ordered Hemphill to stay jailed with out bail after prosecutors raised considerations that his predicament, mixed along with his wealth and connections — together with a historical past of philanthropy and household actual property holdings — may give him the means and incentive to flee the nation.
Hemphill’s lawyer, a public defender assigned to characterize him at the least by his arraignment, had urged Scherzer to maneuver him to a rehabilitation facility to take care of substance abuse points.
Scherzer dominated that, given the actual fact sample laid out by prosecutors, “including efforts to dissuade by force and threats to witnesses from testifying against him,” jailing him was the one manner to make sure Hemphill would return to courtroom.
Hemphill’s alleged conduct, the decide stated, “exhibits his extent to which he’s keen to go to guard himself from dealing with these fees.”
