Woman who accused Copperfield of rape is now facing prostitution charge
By Mike Carter
January 26, 2010
The 23-year-old model who has accused magician David Copperfield of rape is now facing misdemeanor charges of prostitution and filing a false report after she allegedly tried to solicit $2,000 for sex from a man in Bellevue.
The charges were filed Tuesday by the Bellevue City Prosecutor's Office against Lacey L. Carroll of Kirkland, who represented the City of Kirkland and was first runner-up in the 2010 Miss Washington USA pageant.
The victim of the alleged extortion, a 31-year-old single man, told police he knew Carroll as a waitress at a Bellevue nightclub he frequents. On Dec. 2, the pair rented a room at the Hotel Bellevue. Inside the room, the two engaged in a sex act until the woman allegedly told him, "put $2,000 in my purse and you can have it all," according to the man's statement to police.
When he refused, he said, she left the room. The man told police he went to the lobby and found the woman claiming to hotel staff that she had been "taken advantage of."
The man said he called Bellevue police to report that he believed he was about to be extorted, according to his statement.
Carroll called police minutes later to report she had been assaulted, according to the man's statement. She told officers that she could not recall going to the hotel and woke up to find the man on top of her, pinning her arms to the hotel bed.
Carroll was taken to Overlake Hospital Medical Center for a rape examination. However, she later said she was reluctant to release the results to police, according to reports.
Her reason, she said, was the then-pending FBI investigation into her allegations that Copperfield had raped her on his private $50 million island in the Bahamas after meeting her when he performed in Kennewick in 2007.
The woman refused to sign over the medical documents to police, who obtained them after filing a search warrant, according to police. The reports showed no physical injuries nor the presence of any "date rape" drugs in her system, police said. The reports note the woman had a blood-alcohol level of 0.14 percent, nearly twice the legal limit for intoxication.
"Her recorded statement ... was very vague and her statements to police of being in a blackout state are not supported by the hotel security videos, hotel staff statements" or the statements of the alleged victim, a Bellevue police detective wrote in a referral for charges dated Dec. 12.
Earlier this month, federal prosecutors in Seattle dropped their rape investigation of Copperfield after learning Carroll was being investigated by Bellevue police.
(Excerpt)