Cops Probe "Real World" Sex Assault

NOVEMBER 26--TSG has done many dopey stories about reality television and the misfits who populate those programs, but the below search warrant application provides the most disturbing glimpse yet into the dysfunctional TV form. San Diego cops got the warrant last Tuesday after a woman told of being raped in the home where MTV's "Real World" is currently being filmed. According to the 22-year-old victim, she was at a nightclub when she met the rape suspect, who is identified only as "Justin" in the warrant application (the man is reportedly an acquaintance of a male cast member named Randy). The woman said that Justin offered her a beverage, but after finishing the drink, "she blacked out and woke up the following morning...in the guest bedroom on the set of MTV's Real World." When she awoke, the woman was disoriented, had trouble talking, and realized that "someone had had sex with her while she was unconscious." She also noted that an MTV camera crew was filming her at the time she awoke. Jamie Chung, a cast member, told the woman that she might have been sexually assaulted in the bathroom the previous night. Two days after the attack, MTV producer Kevin Lee told cops that, after talking with several cast members, he believed that the woman was attacked in one of the home's two bathrooms. But it does not appear that MTV staff, cast members, or the show's producers, Bunim-Murray, reported their rape suspicions to police. In fact, after the incident, the entire production traveled to Mexico to film there. And while MTV is now claiming that they are cooperating with San Diego investigators, a "Real World" lawyer declined a police request for consent to search a bedroom in the house and stated that MTV would not turn over documents or film before she personally reviewed them. However, citing the "fragile nature of trace evidence such as hair, fingerprints, body fluids, which can easily degrade and erode over time," cops and prosecutors were unwilling to follow MTV's leisurely version of a rape investigation. Instead, they arranged a 1:45 AM telephonic application for a search warrant. That government request was granted by a Superior Court judge who allowed an immediate raid on the "Real World" house, where police seized bed sheets, pillowcases, towels, couch cushions, videotapes, computers, and other possible evidence. (9 pages)