An ex-CIA officer will get 30 years for drugging, filming and assaulting dozens of girls

Warning: This story comprises detailed descriptions of sexual assault.

A former CIA officer has been sentenced to 30 years in jail for drugging, sexually assaulting and filming greater than two dozen girls in a number of nations over greater than a decade.

Brian Jeffrey Raymond, 48, was additionally ordered to serve a lifetime of supervised launch, pay $260,000 in restitution to the victims and register as a intercourse offender after leaving jail, the Justice Division stated in an announcement on Wednesday.

“Today’s sentence ensures that the defendant will be properly marked as a sex offender for life, and he will spend a substantial portion of the rest of his life behind bars,” stated U.S. Legal professional Matthew Graves.

Raymond, of La Mesa, Calif., pleaded responsible final yr to at least one rely every of sexual abuse, abusive sexual contact, coercion and enticement, and transportation of obscene materials, punishable by 24 to 30 years.

As a part of that plea settlement, Raymond admitted to drugging and interesting in nonconsensual sexual acts with 4 girls, and nonconsensual sexual contact with six others. He additionally acknowledged drugging two different girls, and taking both images or movies of 28 victims whereas they had been totally or partially nude with out their information or permission.

“Many of the recordings show Raymond touching and manipulating the victim’s bodies while they were unconscious and incapable of consent,” prosecutors wrote on the time, including that he tried to delete the footage as soon as he realized of the prison investigation.

Prosecutors stated in courtroom filings that Raymond had engaged in a 14-year-long “criminal scheme to exploit women.”

“The defendant’s goal was simple: to sexually and physically assault women when they were at their most vulnerable and to create a lasting collection of photographs and videos memorializing his abhorrent deeds,” they wrote.

The assaults came about at his “government-leased housing” in Mexico Metropolis and different areas — which authorities didn’t specify — between 2006 and 2020, when he was arrested.

Raymond was employed by the U.S. authorities on the U.S. Embassy in Mexico Metropolis from August 2018 till Might 2020, based on the FBI, which says he lived in quite a few different nations together with Peru and the U.S., the place he resided within the Washington, D.C., and San Diego areas.

He speaks Spanish and Mandarin Chinese language, the bureau stated, and met a lot of his victims on courting apps. Prosecutors stated a few of the victims had identified Raymond for years.

The case in opposition to Raymond started in Might 2020, when a unadorned lady was seen screaming for assist from the balcony of his Mexico Metropolis residence.

“Raymond admitted to having sexual intercourse with her, but the woman reported that she had no memory of events after consuming drinks and food provided by Raymond,” the FBI wrote in a 2021 public discover.

Brokers searched Raymond’s digital gadgets, the place they found a whole lot of images and movies depicting no less than 24 “unconscious and nude or partially nude women.”

Court docket filings reviewed by NPR stated they discovered 487 movies and pictures of unconscious girls in “various states of undress” on a number of gadgets belonging to Raymond, in addition to searches for phrases together with “passed out,” “ambien,” “ambien and alcohol and pass out,” “Zolpidem and pharmacies” and “deep sleep” between 2010 and 2011.

The FBI stated nearly all the girls concerned “experienced memory loss during their time with Raymond and had no knowledge of the photographs, videos or any physical contact.”

“For 14 years, Raymond exploited his trusted position as a U.S. government representative to lure women into his confidence,” stated FBI Assistant Director in Cost David Sundberg. “The FBI thanks the brave women who shared information that furthered this investigation.”

A lot of these girls had been watching within the Washington, D.C. courtroom as his sentence was handed down on Wednesday.

Girls describe the shock and ache of studying what had occurred to them

Raymond’s victims crammed 4 rows within the courtroom, and 12 of them took the stand to ask that he be given the utmost sentence, the Washington Put up stories.

Whereas their histories with Raymond various — some met him on courting apps; others had identified him for almost 20 years — they used related phrases to explain him: an awesome man, an ideal gentleman. Or in order that they thought.

Prosecutors wrote in courtroom filings that Raymond’s actions sometimes adopted a sample: He would drug girls at his house alongside wine and snacks, then “spent hours moving, posing and assaulting them.” The images sometimes centered on the ladies’s breasts and genitals, and Raymond “posed their bodies and manipulated their eyelids, mouths and limbs.”

“The defendant lured victims to his apartment where, unbeknownst to them, another woman had just been drugged hours or days before,” prosecutors wrote. “Some stood in his hallway where another woman had recently vomited. Some stumbled onto his bed where another woman had laid unconscious just the night before.”

The prosecutors wrote that whereas victims felt bodily sick and a “deep sense of shame” for being unable to recollect what occurred within the days that adopted, Raymond “played dumb” when requested concerning the night time and would flip the dialog to his busy work schedule or well being points in his household.

He additionally bragged to a detailed good friend about his sexual conquests and added the victims’ names to a listing, prosecutors stated, “noting their age, ethnicity, and, at times, whether their breasts were real.”

The ladies who spoke in courtroom Wednesday, who weren’t named, described the shock they felt when the FBI confirmed them images of themselves being assaulted whereas unconscious — in some circumstances years after the very fact — and of the lasting influence of that trauma on their well-being and relationships with others.

“My body looks like a corpse on his bed,” one sufferer stated, based on the AP. “Now I have these nightmares of seeing myself dead.”

Raymond, who has been held with out bail in a D.C. jail since 2020, listened dejectedly in his orange jail jumpsuit.

At one level, he learn from an announcement, taking accountability for his “downward spiral” and apologizing for what he referred to as his “unconscionable actions.”

“I know whatever I say will not erase what I have done, but I wholeheartedly apologize and I am deeply sorry,” Raymond stated. “This is not who I am, but it is what I became, and I am devastated.”

Raymond’s attorneys had requested the decide to offer him the extra lenient sentence of 24 years, citing his “quasi-military” work on the CIA within the aftermath of 9/11, the AP stories.

“While he was working tirelessly at his government job, he ignored his own need for help, and over time he began to isolate himself, detach himself from human feelings and become emotionally numb,” protection legal professional Howard Katzoff wrote in a courtroom submitting. “He was an invaluable government worker, but it took its toll on him and sent him down a dark path.”

However U.S. District Choose Colleen Kollar-Kotelly instituted the utmost sentence, saying Raymond’s acts had “betrayed his government and his country.”

“It’s safe to say he’s a sexual predator,” she stated, per the AP. “You are going to have a period of time to think about this.”

The CIA faces scrutiny for its dealing with of sexual misconduct complaints

Raymond’s sentencing comes amid a broader reckoning with sexual misconduct on the CIA, from which he resigned after his arrest.

An AP investigation printed in 2023 discovered that no less than two dozen girls had come ahead within the previous months to inform authorities and Congress about sexual assaults, undesirable touching and what they perceived as a marketing campaign by the company to maintain them from talking out about it.

Round that point, the CIA inspector basic additionally opened an unbiased investigation into its alleged mishandling of sexual misconduct. The AP reported in August of this yr {that a} 648-page inner watchdog report confirmed “systemic shortcomings” in that regard.

CIA Director William Burns publicly acknowledged in July that “we have more to do,” and stated the company is taking steps to strengthen its response to stories of sexual assault and sexual harassment, together with streamlining the reporting pathways and hiring a everlasting investigator to facilitate interactions with regulation enforcement.

In an announcement shared with NPR on Thursday, a CIA spokesperson condemned Raymond’s crimes “in the strongest terms,” saying there isn’t any excuse for his “reprehensible, appalling conduct.” They added that the case underscores the agency’s commitment to engaging with law enforcement.

“We take any allegations of sexual assault or sexual harassment extremely seriously, and have taken significant steps to ensure we maintain a safe, inclusive, and respectful environment for our workforce,” they wrote. “We must get this right; our workforce demands no less.”