Judge delays hearing related to videos in case against Newport Beach doctor and his girlfriend
A judge on Thursday delayed a decision on whether attorneys for a Newport Beach surgeon and his girlfriend accused of drugging and raping seven women should receive internal correspondence from prosecutors.
At the center of the pretrial jockeying in the high-profile case are hundreds, potentially more than a thousand, videos collected by law enforcement from Grant William Robicheaux and Cerissa Laura Riley that prosecutors initially alleged contained footage of the couple having sex with intoxicated women.
Attorneys for the couple are currently seeking internal correspondence among prosecutors, law enforcement and lab technicians to see if authorities intentionally misrepresented the contents of the videos to the public.
References to the video footage by then-District Attorney Tony Rackauckas during a pair of September press conferences helped drive international attention to the sexual assault allegations, Robicheaux and Riley’s attorneys contend.
But weeks later, prosecutors acknowledged in court that they had only looked at a fraction of the footage, since they were forced to temporarily halt their examination of the electronic evidence over concerns that some items belonging to Robicheaux, an orthopedic surgeon, were potentially covered by doctor-patient confidentiality.
The video footage has since been turned over to Robicheaux and Riley’s attorneys, who in a motion filed with the court last month denied that any rapes are depicted and accused prosecutors of making “false and reckless public misstatements” about the footage that “set off a frenzy that completely destroyed the integrity of this case and the defendants ability to obtain a fair trial.”
In previous statements, the DA’s office has contended that the case is “not about the video evidence, it is about the seven women who bravely came forward to report their assaults.”
Orange County Superior Court Judge Gregory Jones agreed to continue a hearing to discuss the defense request until March 29. Prosecutors requested the delay after a new attorney from their office was assigned to review the evidence in the case, a task he started on Monday.
Attorney Philip Cohen, who is representing Robicheaux, said they plan to eventually file a motion asking the case against the couple be dismissed due to outrageous government conduct.
Most, if not all, pf the communications requested by the defense attorneys would likely be considered “work product” and therefore not eligible to be turned over to opposing counsel, prosecutors said.