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Arresting Officer Was Disgusted By Drunk "Gunpoint Rape" Cop
By
Ben Yakas
Published Dec 15, 2011
Modified Dec 15, 2011
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By
Ben Yakas
Published Dec 15, 2011
Modified Dec 15, 2011
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In late August, a 27-year-old police officer was accused of raping a woman at gunpoint while off-duty in Manhattan. Officer Michael Pena pleaded not guilty to charges that he forced the 25-year-old schoolteacher into a courtyard behind an Inwood building at gunpoint early that morning and raped her—he even implied it was consensual, and that he was just "cheating" on his girlfriend. Today, the arresting officer testified about Pena's state that morning: "I looked at his shield and I threw it to the ground in disgust," said Officer Timothy Kraft, according to DNAInfo.
"What f--k are you doing?" Kraft said in horror when he found Pena with the woman. Police say that Pena had bloodshot eyes, smelled of alcohol, and was admittedly drunk. His partner spoke to the alleged victim as other officers arrived to help arrest Pena—the woman told police that Pena led her to the alley from a nearby subway station at gunpoint after he asked her where the No. 1 train was. He flashed his police weapon and said, "You're coming with me," before taking her to the isolated courtyard and raping her, she told police.
Pena's defense attorney, Ephraim Savitt, is still arguing that no attack took place and that the alleged victim consented to sex. Savitt previously asked the court for the release of the victims cell phone records in the weeks before and after the attack: "That is to see if there was any contact between the victim and Pena and that is also to see frankly any contact that happened in the days before or on the day in question." The day after his arrest, Pena told police he was afraid to call his girlfriend because he had been with another woman: "I wanted to call my girlfriend, but how am I going to call her when I got arrested for cheating?"
Pena, who is being investigated in two other sex attacks, has maintained his innocence with vague notions of conspiracies, claiming in a jailhouse interview that, "The DA is arresting cops, indicting cops. They're trying to make an example out of me" and "the truth will come out." Pena's lawyers previously told reporters that their client never intended to hurt anyone: “There is absolutely no doubt that there was no intent on the part of Michael Pena to hurt anyone. There was certainly no intent to sexually abuse anybody on that day."
As for that mysterious girlfriend, Savitt says she is still very much in love with her fiance Pena...just not in the country currently: "Uh.... They are engaged and his fiancée is now in the Dominican Republic, but she plans on coming back. She had some business to attend to there. But they are very much engaged, they are very much in love and she is very supportive."
Tagged
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cops
drunk
gunpoint
inwood
manhattan
michael pena
nypd
off-duty
police
rape
Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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