Women testify that fashion mogul Peter Nygard lured them to ‘sordid’ bedroom
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Peter Nygard is facing charges of sexual assault and forcible confinement in a trial, which began on Sept 26.
PHOTO: AFP
TORONTO – The five women testifying that Canadian fashion mogul Peter Nygard sexually assaulted them described for jurors over the past four weeks how they ended up in the hidden bedroom suite at his office.
Decades ago, they said, they each accepted Nygard’s invitation to visit the stylish Toronto headquarters of his fashion kingdom, Nygard International.
He was an eager tour guide, they testified, showing off a high-end car in the garage, as well as a glistening showroom.
But, they said, he was most excited about bringing guests upstairs to the wood-panelled bedroom suite. It was behind the sliding doors of that room that each woman said he sexually assaulted them.
“I was a prisoner in that room,” said one woman, the last of five complainants to conclude her testimony at a Toronto courthouse in October as prosecutors prepared to close their case.
The five women, who were between 16 and 28 years old at the time of the alleged attacks, are the central witnesses in the case against Nygard, who is facing charges of sexual assault and forcible confinement in the Toronto trial, which began on Sept 26.
He has denied the accusations in statements from his legal team and pleaded not guilty to the charges.
The trial is the beginning of what could be years of criminal proceedings for Nygard, now 82 and in declining health, his lawyers said.
He also faces sexual assault charges in New York, where he will be extradited once the cases in Toronto, Montreal and his hometown Winnipeg, Manitoba, are complete.
In Toronto, prosecutors argued that Nygard had a pattern of luring women into his office bedroom in different episodes from the 1980s until 2005.
The moodily lit room immediately struck the fifth central witness as a “sordid environment”, she told jurors.
After flying her to Toronto from Los Angeles and making sexual remarks over a brief meal, Nygard led the woman upstairs in what she thought was a “pit stop” on a tour of the office, she testified.
He pinned her on the bed and raped her, she said.
Nygard has been awaiting his criminal trial in prison for the last two years after being arrested at his home in Winnipeg.
The trial resumes this week and is expected to wrap up in less than three weeks. NYTIMES
