Woman Testifies That Danny Masterson Raped Her

Earlier on Wednesday, J.B. testified about the aftermath of a September 2002 incident in which she said Masterson penetrated her anally without her consent. After that incident, which is not charged in this case, she said she told a number of her and Masterson’s mutual friends who were members of the Church of Scientology — including Lisa Marie Presley, who left the church in 2014, and Shaffer.

She said Presley was shocked, and Shaffer was upset — not with Masterson, but with J.B.

“It was her boss that I was speaking ill of,” J.B. said.

She added several of her friends wrote and submitted what she called “knowledge reports” to Scientology officials for “upsetting the group.” She said it was her understanding that members would write these reports when they had “relevant information about something that was nonideal,” so church officials could then call people in to take “steps to fix what we did wrong or to stop us from doing that again.” As a result, J.B. said, she was summoned to the church’s ethics office and underwent “ethics programs” over several weeks in which she was “pressured” to make amends with Masterson and other members.

She testified that she was also told to “take responsibility” for what happened and stop blaming Masterson or holding him responsible for what she says he did.

J.B. said church officials told her “to look at my actions, what I did wrong, and how I was probably not an unwilling participant.”

When Deputy District Attorney Reinhold Mueller asked whether that instruction surprised her, she said it didn’t because she understood from growing up in Scientology that “you can never be a victim.”

“Nothing ever happens to you that you didn’t cause,” J.B. testified. “No matter how horrible, no matter what happens to you, you are responsible. You created that.”

Jurors have been instructed by the court to not take witnesses’ testimony about Scientology and its practices as fact but to only consider them in order to judge their credibility. Even so, the church, which has been heavily scrutinized for its beliefs, secrecy, and alleged physically and financially abusive practices, is expected to play a prominent role in the proceedings. During opening statements, Mueller narrowed in on several rules and terms used by the church to show how Masterson escaped accountability for so long and why the women initially feared turning to law enforcement.

Following the alleged assault in 2003, J.B. said she went to the ethics office and spoke with the same official she had talked to after the 2002 incident.

It was during this meeting that the official warned her against using the word “rape,” she testified during a preliminary hearing last year. On Wednesday, she referenced the warning by stating that “he corrected a word that I used.”

It wasn’t until over a year later in June 2004 that J.B. first reported the incident to the Los Angeles Police Department. She testified that she didn’t go to the police sooner because in the church community “you cannot report another Scientologist in good standing,” as she understood Masterson was, to the authorities.

“I immediately would be guilty of a high crime,” J.B. said. The penalty for which was “expulsion” from the church, meaning that no members could speak or have any contact with her. For J.B. that meant being cut off from her parents, who were also Scientologists and who she lived with and worked for, and all of her friends.

“My life would be over,” she testified, choking up again. “My parents would have to disconnect from me. My daughter couldn’t go to … school. I couldn’t talk to my friends ever again. … I wouldn’t have anywhere to work or live.”

Prior to reaching out to the LAPD, J.B. sought permission from the church’s International Justice Chief to press criminal charges against Masterson, but her request was denied. After talking to police, J.B. said she assumed that an order to declare her a “suppressive person,” or what Mueller described to the jury as an enemy of the church during his opening statement, had been prepared and that she was to accept it unless there was another way to fix the issue.

That’s when, she testified, that her father and a church attorney offered her the option to enter into a nondisclosure agreement. The details of that agreement are not to be discussed in court under a previous ruing by Olmedo, but as part of the terms J.B. was paid $400,000. J.B. said that in her eyes, her options were to sign the agreement or essentially “end [her] existence” and “go get declared.”

No charges were ultimately filed against Masterson in relation to J.B.’s 2004 complaint. She testified that she was first contacted about the investigation that resulted in the current charges he is on trial for back in 2016.

When asked by Mueller whether she had any concerns about testifying in these proceedings, J.B. said she thinks she’s broken the NDA “about 50 times” and could face financial penalties as a result. He followed up by asking whether she feared any retaliation or harassment from other members of the church.

“Half this courtroom,” J.B. said without pause. As she spoke, Masterson’s wife and actor Bijou Phillips, his siblings, and other family members and friends were among those seated in the court gallery.

J.B. is expected to continue testifying on Thursday morning under cross examination by Masterson’s attorney.