Armie Hammer Won’t Face Sexual Assault Charges: Los Angeles D.A.
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Following more than two years of investigation, the Los Angeles County District Attorney has decided not to file sexual assault charges against actor Armie Hammer. A woman, using the name Effie, alleged that Hammer had raped her in 2017 and had been physically abusive with her over a four-year, on-again/off-again relationship. She reported him to police in Feb. 2021.
“Sexual assault cases are often difficult to prove, which is why we assign our most experienced prosecutors to review them,” Tiffiny Blacknell, the D.A. office’s Director of the Bureau of Communications, said in a statement. “In this case, those prosecutors conducted an extremely thorough review, but determined that at this time, there is insufficient evidence to charge Mr. Hammer with a crime.
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“As prosecutors, we have an ethical responsibility to only charge cases that we can prove beyond a reasonable doubt,” Blacknell continued. “We know that it is hard for women to report sexual assault. Even when we cannot move forward with a prosecution, our victim service representatives will be available to those who seek our victim support services. Due to the complexity of the relationship and inability to prove a non-consensual, forcible sexual encounter we are unable to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Hammer expressed his gratitude to the D.A. in an Instagram statement. “I am very grateful to the District Attorney for conducting a thorough investigation and coming to the conclusion that I have stood by this entire time, that no crime was committed,” he said. “I look forward to beginning what will be a long, difficult process of putting my life back together now that my name is cleared.”
Effie, who used the Instagram account House of Effie, started posting screenshots of messages between her and Hammer two years ago. In the notes, he detailed fantasies involving rape, violent sex, and cannibalism. Other women subsequently came forward with similar allegations. Effie participated in a March 2021 press conference with lawyer Gloria Allred, in which Effie described an alleged rape that occurred over four hours in April 2017. “I thought that he was going to kill me,” she said. (Hammer denied the allegations, saying the encounter was consensual.)
“I am disappointed with the L.A. County District Attorney’s decision not to prosecute Armie Hammer,” Effie tells Rolling Stone. “I felt a duty to speak out and file a report in order to try to hold Armie accountable for all the harm and trauma he has caused me and in order to protect other women from experiencing similar abuse. It has cost me a great deal to have spoken out and filed a report against Armie’s abuse. Since I came forward, I have received death threats, rape threats, countless attacks, and atrocious, incessant harassment. I believe that many of Armie’s victims were afraid to come forward. My hope is that one day, rapists won’t get away with it.”
Following Effie’s statements, several other women subsequently came forward with similar allegations. One named Paige Lorenze claimed Hammer was interested in “eating her ribs” and had carved an “A” into her flesh, while another, Courtney Vucekovich, alleged he “manipulated” her into BDSM acts that “frankly scared” her. A docuseries about the allegations against Hammer, House of Hammer, came out last year.
This past February, Hammer gave an interview to Air Mail in which he reiterated his denials of violence and assault but admitted he’d been emotionally abusive. “I would scoop up these women, bring them into it — into this whirlwind of travel and sex and drugs and big emotions flying around — and then as soon as I was done, I’d just drop them off and move on to the next woman, leaving that woman feeling abandoned or used,” he said.
The same month as the Air Mail interview, a judge in Aspen, Colorado granted a restraining order against Hammer that a woman had filed. Because neither the woman nor Hammer had showed up, the judge dismissed it, saying she could refile it. The woman had alleged that she and Hammer had a “safe word” but that Hammer “choked me during sexual intercourse that led me to lose consciousness,” ignoring the safe word. She claimed Hammer was under the influence of alcohol, ecstasy and ketamine at the time. Hammer’s attorney denied the accusation in a statement to Rolling Stone.
Since Effie came forward, the film industry turned its back on Hammer, who was once seen as a breaking star after the release of Call Me by Your Name. Variety reports that Hammer’s agency, WME, dropped him, and all of the productions he was involved in fired him in early 2021. One movie he was featured in, Death on the Nile, came out in February 2022 because reshoots would have been too expensive. The film was a commercial dud, possibly because of the allegations against Hammer.
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