Sarah Lawrence Sex Cult: Lawrence Ray trial exposes BRUTAL crimes committed on students
Sex cult leader Lawrence Ray was accused of several vicious acts during the first day of his trial at the Federal District Court in Manhattan on March 10, 2022. In her opening statement, Assistant US Attorney Lindsey Keenan offered various examples of sordid acts committed by Ray to the students of Sarah Lawrence College, where his daughter studied.
Ray is facing a massive 17-count indictment including extortion, forced labor, sex trafficking, and money laundering for "physical and psychological threats and coercion to indoctrinate and exploit a group of college students." According to the Department of Justice, Ray extorted as much as $1 million from five victims, while forcing at least one girl into prostitution. The acts continued for nearly a decade, shortly after he walked out of jail, ending with his arrest in February 2020.
RELATED ARTICLES
Allison Mack to be sentenced for her role in NXIVM cult, Internet says 'she doesn't regret'
At the time of his arrest, a DoJ announcement did detail some of the acts Ray engaged in, including "his manipulative interrogation sessions" which formed the backbone for his extortion and forced labor of the students. The New Jersey resident immediately became infamous for his "cult leader tactics", more about which we learned during the first day of his trial.
Ray's actions come to the spotlight
While many of Ray's actions have been reported on in the past, Keenan opted to go into great detail about what exactly happened over the course of a decade in her opening statement, leaving little to the imagination. One woman was handcuffed to a chair, naked, before being suffocated with a plastic bag. "He took the bag off of her face. He towered over her as she was handcuffed to that chair, gasping. She was helpless. Unable to move, unable to breathe, unable to scream for help. For hours he tormented her, putting the plastic bag over her head again and again and again," Keenan said.
"He ruthlessly threatened and extorted his victims to get what he wanted — sex, money, and power," she added. One of Ray's victims, Santos Rosario also testified on the opening day and added, "He would hit me. He slapped me. He held a knife to my throat. He held a knife to my genitals." To back up Rosario's claim, prosecutors then played an audio clip in which Ray can be heard saying, "F-----g little brat. How does that feel?"
Despite that damning testimony and exhibits, Ray's lawyers attempted to flip the narrative. "This was not a criminal enterprise. This was a group of storytellers," they said and attempted to portray it as more nuanced than the indictment stated. "Larry’s stories were full of mystery, intrigue, and excitement. They wanted to hear more," Ray's attorney Allegra Glashausser told the jury. The defense went on to claim that the students eventually created their own stories, a narrative that is a complete 360 of what the prosecution claims.
For those unaware, this isn't Ray's first time in court. In 2000, he was tied to organized crime and charged for participating in a scheme where mobsters and stockbrokers were accused of cheating investors out of $40 million. He was slapped with nine months of home confinement and five years of probation over that case. Later, he served time in New Jersey over a child custody dispute, for which he was released in 2010. He now faces life in prison if found guilty in this case.