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A Massachusetts lawyer, once named one of People magazine’s most eligible bachelors, is charged with rape and his trial began in Boston on Tuesday.
Gary Zerola, 51, a former district attorney and attorney, is accused of raping a 23-year-old woman, leaving him behind the bench in the role of defendant and not lawyer.
Credit: NY Post via Boston Police Department
According to WFXT Boston 25 News, he has pleaded not guilty to the two rape charges brought against him by the woman, who took the stand on the first day of the trial.
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The victim told police she was partying with her friends in the North End one night in 2016, and later woke up when Zerola took off her clothes and attacked her at his friend’s apartment.
“This was no stranger,” Assistant District Attorney Thomas Brant reported. “This was also not permission for what Gary Zerola did to her.”
Inside a courtroom with gavel in sight. (iStock)
Zerola’s attorney, Rosemary Scapicchio, on the other hand, reportedly said the victim was lying.
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“In short, she’s a liar,” said Scapicchio. “The story you just heard from the Commonwealth doesn’t tell half of what happened.”
Zerola previously served as a district attorney in Essex County for a year and in 2000 for two months in Suffolk County.
When charges against him were filed in 2021, Zerola had been released on $10,000 bail for allegedly raping another woman in 2016. He pleaded not guilty to that case.
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Prosecutors also said two other women have alleged that Zerola raped them in the 1990s, and that he has been acquitted in separate rape and attempted rape cases in Massachusetts. A previous sexual assault case against him was also dropped in Florida.
In 2001, Zerola, then 29, was featured on People as one of “America’s Top 50 Bachelors” alongside actors Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.
Zerola was a lawyer and foster care advocate who founded his own law practice after nearly two years as a Massachusetts district attorney.
He mentioned his troubled childhood in an interview and said he lived in more than 12 foster homes from age 3 to 15.
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“Statistically, I should be in debt or in jail because of the upbringing I had,” Zerola told People.
Greg Wehner is a breaking news reporter for Fox News Digital.
