On Monday, former San Francisco 49ers defensive tackle Dana Stubblefield was charged with raping a "developmentally delayed" woman after he interviewed her for a nanny position at his home. Stubblefield is facing five felony charges for what Santa Clara deputy district attorney Tim McInerny described as a "crime of violence against a vulnerable victim…She was looking for a job and she was unconscionably assaulted."Details of the incident, as alleged by a Morgan Hill police report, indicate Stubblefield found the woman through a babysitting website called Sittercity.com and arranged for an interview at his home.
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Stubblefield then paid her $80 and let her leave, at which point she drove straight to the hospital to report the rape and DNA evidence later matched Stubblefield.Stubblefield denied the charges through his attorneys last night and then earlier today appeared for a press conference with those attorneys, who doubled down on the denial. His lead attorney, Ken Rosenfeld, is attacking this from all angles. According to Rosenfeld, Stubblefield is not only the victim of a money grab, but also the political aspirations of the local district attorney in an election year.Rosenfeld then took the fight to TMZ, where he appeared alongside Stubblefield, as he continued to shame the victim, and called her reported mental disability a legal fiction. They also pointed to a string of text messages she sent to Stubblefield, allegedly seeking money after the incident, as well as pointing out her litigious nature and criminal history. Rosenfeld noted that she has entered a plea to at least one of her arrests—approximately two years ago—which requires a judge to find that the individual has the capacity to "knowingly, intelligently, and voluntarily enter the plea."Perhaps the most bizarre moment of the media blitz, however, came when Stubblefield issued his denial. While he couldn't quite get the word "consensual" out, he did say this: "One of my primary charities is Special Olympics, something that's truly dear to my heart. This is why these allegations hurt me so badly."The interview lasted about 20 minutes, police said, then the woman left. Minutes later, she received a text message from Stubblefield saying he wanted to pay her for her time that day, the report said. She went back to the house where Stubblefield picked her up, carried her to a room, raped her and forced her to "orally copulate him," the report said.