I originally posted this article on another website. I wasn’t allowed to keep the article there so I am posting it on my own website.
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I’m about to get preachy guys so consider yourself warned.
For years when a woman would report an assault of any kind, including rape or physical abuse, she would almost always be revictimized by the authorities as they would be forced to relive their nightmare as they tell the story of what happened to them, only to have them be accused of lying or have their stories picked apart and told how things in their story don’t seem likely.
Many years ago I used to be married. I walked into my husband’s home office to gather up any dirty dishes he had in there. As I picked up some dirty plates or silverware, I asked him what was in the brown paper bag on his desk. I was just curious. It was oddly out of place.
My husband turned on me, apparently not liking to be questioned about items on his desk. He beat the living hell out of me. He threw me against a wall, kicked me repeatedly.
I was 6 months pregnant at the time.
I ran to the living room (stupid mistake) where I had been ironing. This gave him access to a weapon, which he used to further beat me. I finally got away and was able to call the police. Yes, I tried to fight back but I’m small. It’s not easy to do, against a man nearly 11 inches taller than me and 100+ pounds heavier. Still, I tried. I would learn later that was also my stupid mistake because that meant he had marks on him too.
When I got away and called the police they showed up to investigate. They called an ambulance who tended to my visible wounds.
The police spoke to me and my husband but they didn’t arrest him. They arrested me.
It turns out I was considered the “first aggressor” as – and I swear this is what the cop said to me, was the one who went into his office. I need to learn that you don’t enter a man’s private sanctum without his permission.
Yes, I got a lawyer and yes the judge dropped the charges as any sane person could tell I was the actual victim. But I lost the baby so in the end, my suffering continued long after my physical beating was over.
This story isn’t unusual. Women all over the world can tell you similar versions of their own nightmares of dealing with authorities and it’s why all to often we don’t report crimes of rape or assault.
This event took place years ago, but the truth of the matter is, this still happens, even today in 2018 when we are supposedly so enlightened.
Nobody believes us even if we are standing there bloody and bruised.
I am not one to every share personal stories about myself with people. In fact, many people I work with for decades don’t know things about me like this or even that I was once married or have sisters. I just am not one to talk about myself.
I, however, am making this exception today because I need to make a point.
Another author on another website I regularly blog on, posted some things that I do not agree with. And in doing so he also used the word “WE” implying all of us from MikeSouth.com were in agreement with what he was saying. WE are not.
He also went on to say something like — is that how someone abused normally behaves?
How the fuck does he know how someone normally behaves when they are assaulted? What in the hell does “NORMAL” have to do with anything relating to assault? If anything nothing is ever normal again and there is not a pre-defined standard pattern of behavior one should be acting like when they are abused.
Sorry but it just doesn’t work like that. Just because you think the way she acted or behaved isn’t normal doesn’t mean shit. Because you weren’t the victim you don’t get a fucking say in the matter of how she behaves.
You can’t be like she’s rich if she was really abused she wouldn’t have stayed around to get her paycheck. How the fuck do you know what her finances are?
Yes, as you might have guessed by now I am highly offended by the bullshit this other author is spouting specifically about how Leigh Raven isn’t distraught enough to be a real victim.
Sounds like to me he’s projecting his own battle with being accused (or maybe even falsely accused) of assault in this case. While I can’t say that’s true or not, that is how it feels to me.
They used to have sex in real life and they were friends so he couldn’t have abused her. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? Do you know how often a female knows her abuser? More often than not!
Listen I’m not going to say there aren’t women in our industry that have lied. Sadly more than a few names come to mind when it comes to lying about sexual assault. It’s gotten so bad that some may even say it’s a pretty common occurrence.
In fact, it has gotten so bad it is the very reason why some directors have taken to installing nanny cams on set that runs from the moment the girl arrives on set and until she leaves, in addition with the normal filming of the scene and event he BTS cameras. These are a directors insurance policy in case a girl decides to lie.
But just because some people lie doesn’t mean EVERY girl lies. But those who do lie, are a big reason why so many girls aren’t trusted.
And it is in a big part because of girls who do lie about rape and abuse that we are in this situation we are in today with the Leigh Raven story.
Case in point, there is a female who is used to be repped by OC Modeling and was at the time of this incident. She and her suitcase pimp boyfriend would go to industry events and look for people standing on the fringe, sort off on their own, maybe looking a little like they didn’t want to be there.
The boyfriend would strike up a conversation with the person – maybe talk about how the event sucks or how they hate going to these things. Eventually, he would bring his girlfriend into the mix, the established female performer, that was repped by OC Modeling. People knew her so people trusted her. They would eventually suggest they “get out of here” and they would go back to the victim’s place to “party”.
The boyfriend, I mean suitcase pimp (because let’s be real that is what he is) would be very aggressive on insisting the victim and his girl go off and “have fun”.
In the first came I learned about the scam, the performer and the victim went back to his room but the victim decided he just couldn’t go through with it because I guess he was creeped out that her boyfriend was just in the other room. I don’t know if he couldn’t get it up or just didn’t want to have sex with her on his own. Either way, he turned down sex with the girl. He reported that she got noticeably freaked out by it and became very pushy, really trying to force the issue, even saying like let me just give you a blowjob then. That made the victim even more freaked out, suspecting at this point something was up so he ended their alone time in his room, which by his account was less than 5 minutes.
When they came out of the victims bedroom, The suitcase pimp appeared angry or agitated and they left soon after. The victim at the time wrote it off as just a weird night and went back to hanging out with the two other girls there at the time, his own friends. So again keep in mind, there are two witnesses to this whole thing.
The police report didn’t list their stage names only their legal names so I obviously can’t name who the two witnesses even were.
Anywho moving on, the next day the performer called the victim crying insisting that she return to his place to be paid for “services rendered”.
The victim was like fuck you we didn’t do anything plus I don’t pay for sex.
The performer cried insisting she needed the guys help that her boyfriend, I mean suitcase pimp wouldn’t let her return home unless she came back with some money.
The guy didn’t pay her. So she contacted at least two industry lawyers that I know of, one of which, the man who apparently took the case, is best known as the man who will take blowjobs in his office in exchange for payment. Big shocker this is the guy who ended up on the case, right?
So the sleazy lawyer called the victim and demanded like $4,000 for payment for services rendered. Now I don’t exactly keep up with the escort game, but even the biggest names in our industry right now aren’t getting $4,000 an hour for hooking. So even if the victim did bang her, and it only lasted 5 minutes (as by all accounts that is how long they were alone together in his room), is this chick work $4,000 for 5 minutes? REALLY????????????
So when the victim laughed and told the lawyer to fuck off and good luck suing him over that one, then the victim went and filed a police report, and brought statements from the two other witnesses, both also female performers, one of which was oddly enough very good friends with the performer pulling the scam.
So what did the girl do next? Claimed she needed the $4,000 because the money was what he agreed to pay her to do a scene. Because you know, people often film scenes in the middle of the night after an XBIZ event, that lasts only 5 minutes.
Only catch? There was no scene.
There was no film that could ever be produced because the scene was never made. So why then did she feel she needed to be paid this $4,000?
Even if there was a scene, that again lasted 5 whole fucking minutes, did she deserve $4,000?
Can you name any female performer out there making $4,000 for a 5-minute b/g scene? Nope because it doesn’t happen.
So now this girl claims because she wasn’t paid for this “scene” she was raped.
I asked her once how she could claim she was raped when according to her story, she consented to do a scene that never took place, so her complaint is a civil matter of not being paid for a scene that didn’t happen. That’s not a criminal case of rape. You know what she told me?
Karen Tynan, yes the very same lawyer currently repping Tony T in the sexual assault case against Nikki Benz, told her it was rape because the victim promised to pay her money for a scene and never did and that makes it rape.
I still don’t even to this day know how to wrap my head around this story. I reached out more than a few times to speak to Karen Tynan about this but as you might imagine, she refused to take my calls and never responded to my emails or texts or voicemails either. Shocker huh? ?
But damn it if I’m not getting off point.
Neither you nor I will ever know the full true story of Leigh Raven. What I can tell you is that I have a few problems what Rico Strong, two of which are the biggest and they are #1 she said she had a shallow cervix. She specifically told him this and when he pushed in too deep during their scene she expressed concern, he not only didn’t stop but as you can see he acknowledged he knew he was going to deep and made some nasty comment about it as a crude joke, like how she couldn’t “handle it”. Well yeah, you dick she told you her body was shaped in a way that she couldn’t handle it in advance.
That issue alone was all I needed to hear to know everything I needed to know about Rico Strong.
He knew her limit, purposely passed it, she warned him she was passed it, he acknowledged he knew it and did it and pushed passed it even further – purposely causing her physical harm.
FUCK RICO STRONG.
Next, my issue is that knowing this, he basically threw Just Dave (the director) his so-called “friend” under a bus in an interview with AVN saying he (Rico Strong) was just the paid male talent and he was only doing what he was told to do.
No dick, Just Dave didn’t tell you to purposely and physically harm her or knowingly push past her prescribed limits. You did that you piece of shit all on your own.
Then instead of manning up and apologizing for it, you throw your friend the director under the bus and blame it all on him saying you were just doing what he told you to do.
Man with friends like you Rico Strong who the fuck needs enemies? YOU SUCK.
Just Dave stood by you trying to work this all out and the first chance you got you threw him under a bus. You are a horrible person.
My last problem, I know I said I only had two major complains but actually I have three. I forgot about the death threats.
When Leigh Raven came forward with her story, either Rico Strong or someone on behalf of Rico Strong made threats of violence against her. She was scared for her life and for a short time had to go into hiding.
Now Rico Strong could say hey that wasn’t me man and I’m not cool with that and anyone threatening this girl’s life should stop doing it on my behalf. I’m not oaky with that. Did he? Nope. He didn’t.
Not a fucking word from this piece of shit.
He could have manned up and did the right thing, but I think we all know by now Rico Strong isn’t a real man.
I don’t know if everything either person said was true or not.
But what I do know is, as long as we keep victim blaming, real victims are never going to come forward.
We need to take a step back and think before we speak.
Yes, some girls lie but that does not mean every girl is a liar.
We need to remember there is no TYPICAL way a victim of an assault is supposed to act or say. She’s in survival mode and sometimes says or does things that are beyond rational.
Man I have spent way to much time on this post so I’ll just say in closing we need to end the practice of exit interviews, demanding that we give them or we don’t get paid is wrong on so many levels.