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Cuba Gooding Jr. has been charged with raping a woman twice after bringing her to her room at a Manhattan hotel in 2013, in a lawsuit against the actor on Tuesday.
The new allegations go much deeper than a series of allegations that Mr Gooding subjected women to unwanted sexual touching, three of which form the basis of an upcoming criminal trial. Of the more than 20 charges raised in court documents, none had so far alleged rape.
According to the lawsuit, which was filed by an anonymous woman named Jane Doe, she first met Mr. Gooding at a restaurant in Greenwich Village. He invited her and a friend for a drink at the Mercer Hotel in SoHo. There, Mr. Gooding led the woman to her bedroom on the fifth floor, where he said he needed to change clothes quickly, according to the lawsuit.
When the woman tried to leave the room, according to the lawsuit, Mr. Gooding blocked her path and eventually pushed her onto the bed and raped her. Subsequently, as the woman tried to escape, Mr. Gooding raped her again, according to the complaint.
She told Mr. Gooding “no” several times, according to the lawsuit, but he did not stop. One of the lawyers representing the woman is Gloria Allred, a longtime women’s rights lawyer.
Mr Gooding’s attorney, Mark J. Heller, said the prosecution’s allegations were “completely false and defamatory”, noting that they had never given rise to criminal charges in the past seven years.
The lawsuit alleges that Mr. Gooding violated a municipal law designed to protect victims who are targeted on the basis of their gender and have caused the complainant physical and emotional injuries.
Groping allegations against Mr. Gooding first came to the public last year when a woman told police Mr. Gooding squeezed her chest at the Magic Hour Rooftop Bar at the Moxy NYC Times Hotel Square on Seventh Avenue in Manhattan. After that, two more women filed complaints which resulted in criminal charges, and Mr. Gooding now faces three rounds of groping charges.
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office had publicly documented the allegations of 19 additional women with unwanted sexual touching charges against Mr. Gooding, asking that the jury be allowed to hear the testimony of these women to demonstrate a role model. A judge ordered that two of the women be allowed to provide such testimony.
At a court hearing last week, deputy prosecutor Jenna Long said the total number of women who had laid charges against Mr Gooding had risen to 30.
His trial was supposed to start in April, but the coronavirus pandemic has blocked proceedings.
Last year Mr Gooding was pursued by one of the women he is accused of groping, Natasha Ashworth. She accused Mr. Gooding of pinching her buttocks while serving him at a Manhattan nightclub.
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