More details about the rape allegations against Oscar-winning screenwriter and director Paul Haggis are coming out.
Haggis was arrested in Italy over the weekend on charges of sexual assault. According to the latest reports, the unidentified woman who filed the charges told investigators, “I was raped for days.” She added, “We were supposed to work together, but instead, he raped me from Sunday evening to Wednesday.”
She said the multiple attacks were so brutal that she cannot have sex. She escaped after he dropped her off at an airport with no ticket, just money.
Local news reports say the police believe her injuries are consistent with the allegations.
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The woman was examined at an airport clinic and taken to a hospital for treatment and psychological counseling, according to the reports. Authorities said she suffered repeated nonconsensual assaults including one so brutal she was left unable to have sex and “forced to seek medical attention,” which she says ended her ordeal.
Italian authorities say they’re looking at camera footage from Haggis’ hotel and the airport that reportedly corroborates their movements. The Daily Beast says police waited until the woman was safely out of the country before arresting Haggis, whose family had joined him by then. He was held in Brindisi overnight and released under house arrest awaiting arraignment.
Through his attorney, Haggis denies all wrongdoing.
Four years ago, Haggis was publicly accused by four separate women of various forms of misconduct, including a rape that allegedly occurred as far back as the mid-90s. Those accusations were serious enough they basically killed Haggis’s career as both a screenwriter and director.
Haggis had been flying high after winning the Adapted Screenplay Oscar in 2004 for director Clint Eastwood’s Million Dollar Baby. The following year he co-wrote and directed Crash, which won Best Original Screenplay and Best Picture—which is especially impressive considering what a pretentious pail of shit that movie is.
One of Haggis’s chief defenders has been Leah Remini, who has been dining out for years on her “escape” from Scientology. Haggis claimed that the four allegations stemmed from his decision to leave Scientology and that it was a form of retribution. In an open letter, Remini backed him up and added, “We expect the next ‘revelations’ about Paul Haggis in this campaign to destroy him to be based on information culled from his Scientology files in the form of more ‘anonymous’ accusers, hiding behind a lawyer who will never have to disclose who is paying their bill.”
The four accusers say their allegations have nothing to do with Scientology. One of the four filed a civil suit against Haggis, which is ongoing.
The hell of it is that what really happened doesn’t matter. Haggis has no career. His writing, directing, and producing career — which had been going great guns — all came to a dead stop after these four women came forward, and came to a dead stop without a trial of any kind.
This latest allegation is serious and need to be taken seriously and investigated thoroughly. But we have to remember that Haggis is innocent until proven guilty. It’s not up to us or Hollywood or anyone to assign guilt to this man. Only a court can do that.