SOURCE :- THE AGE NEWS
New York: Three brothers, including two of America’s most successful luxury real estate brokers, were convicted of sex-trafficking charges after a five-week trial over accusations that they used drugs and force to rape scores of women they had dazzled with their wealth and opulent lifestyle.
The verdict came on Monday (New York time) after 11 women testified they were sexually assaulted by one or more of the brothers: twins Oren and Alon Alexander, 38, and Tal Alexander, 39.
All three of the men shook their heads as the jury foreperson said “guilty” 19 times as the verdict questions considered by jurors were read aloud. Tal Alexander dropped his head into his arms crossed before him.
Sentencing was set for August 6, when the brothers could face up to life in prison. They remain jailed.
US Attorney Jay Clayton said in a statement that the sex crimes highlighted in the trial “are all too prevalent in our society and all too often go unreported and unpunished. The truth is sex-trafficking and other federal sex offences are present in many walks of life and we have not done enough to root it out.”
Marc Agnifilo, a defence lawyer who spoke outside the courthouse, said it was “not the verdict we were looking for, but we’re going to keep fighting”.
“We believe in our clients’ innocence and we’re not going to stop fighting until we prevail, and we believe that we will one day prevail. Today was not the outcome we were looking for, obviously, but … our resolve is unshaken.“.
Agnifilo said the defendants were disappointed with the verdict. He said he believed there were many appeals issues that will be raised in the future.
The women described attacks that occurred after they were invited to vacation locales including the Hamptons, a Caribbean cruise and a ski trip in Aspen, Colorado. More than 60 women say they were raped by one or more of the brothers, according to prosecutors.
Defence lawyers suggested the accusers had faulty memories or were hoping to cash in on the brothers’ fortunes. The brothers, their lawyers conceded, were womanisers. But they insisted any sex was consensual. The jury began deliberating on Thursday and worked through Friday and into Monday, when they sent several notes seeking clarification on the law regarding two charges.
All three men were convicted of the top counts: conspiracy to commit sex trafficking and sex trafficking by force, fraud or coercion. Alon and Tal Alexander were convicted of sex trafficking of a minor while Alon and Oren Alexander were convicted of aggravated sexual abuse by force or intoxicant and sexual abuse of a physically incapacitated person. Oren Alexander was also convicted of sexual exploitation of a minor.
When the verdict was announced, the brothers’ parents shook their heads. Alon Alexander’s wife held a hand against her face.
The verdict represented a spectacular fall for Oren and Tal Alexander, who were brokers at real estate powerhouse Douglas Elliman before starting their own firm, Official. Alon Alexander worked at the family’s private security firm.
Besides the criminal case, the trio faced about two dozen lawsuits, including one filed on Thursday by Tracy Tutor, a star of Million Dollar Listing Los Angeles on Bravo. She alleges Oren Alexander drugged and assaulted her in a restaurant bathroom while she was in New York City for a real estate event.
When those lawsuits began being filed, multiple women came forward claiming they had also been sexually harassed or assaulted, and that the brothers’ misconduct with women had been an open secret in the real estate world for years.
In March 2024, Australian woman Kate Whiteman accused Oren and Alon of raping and kidnapping her, triggering an FBI probe into the brothers.
But she never got her day in court. Last month, her lawyers agreed to pause her civil case before the New York Supreme Court to allow the criminal trial to take precedence over her own claims.
Late last year, she was found dead at Cowra in Central West NSW. Her death is not being treated as suspicious.
During the trial, many of the women who testified said they believed they’d been drugged after they were handed alcohol by one of the brothers. Some described feeling like they’d lost control of their bodies after less than one drink.
The brothers met the women at nightclubs, parties and on dating apps, taking some on trips to ritzy locales, and paying for flights and luxury lodging.
One woman testified that she met the brothers in 2012 at a party at actor Zac Efron’s Manhattan apartment. She said she had almost no interaction with the actor, who was not accused of any misdeeds, and went to a nightclub later in the night before waking up naked with a nude Alon Alexander standing over her.
Prosecutors pushed back on the idea that the accusers were hoping to cash in on lawsuits. Only two have lawsuits pending, prosecutor Elizabeth Espinosa told jurors, and both are wealthy themselves.
One woman who testified said she was raped by Alon Alexander in Aspen, Colorado, in 2017, when she was 17 years old. She said she was the daughter of a billionaire.
“I don’t want their money. I just don’t want them to have it,” she told jurors.
Lindsey Acree, an artist and gallery owner in Brooklyn, testified she was raped by Tal Alexander and a second man at a home in the Hamptons in the summer of 2011 after becoming so disoriented from drinking less than half a glass of wine that she felt paralysed.
The woman, now 40, said she sued Tal Alexander last year even though she will “never need their money” because she became upset that the Alexanders “kept calling us gold diggers, shake down artists, con artists”.
“If there’s a kid with a stick who keeps hitting people, you take their stick away,” she told the jury. “Money is their stick, so you take it away so they can’t hurt people any more.”
The Associated Press does not typically identify people who say they are victims of sexual assault unless they choose to come forward publicly, as Acree and Tutor have done.
Besides witness testimony, prosecutors tried to prove their case through text and email messages in which the brothers seemed to boast about their sexual exploits and their knowledge of the effects various drugs can have on a woman’s inhibitions, along with a blog that included a post titled: “It’s not rape if …”
Prosecutors said the brothers emailed about sneaking drugs – or “party favours” – onto a cruise ship, recorded at least one assault on video and shared photos of victims.
AP
Anyone needing support can contact 1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732), National Sexual Abuse and Redress Support Service 1800 211 028, Lifeline 13 11 14, and Kids Helpline 1800 55 1800.
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