“Just a heads up…….”
That was the first of many texts, emails & DMs I would get about the Derrick Rose’s civil rape trial. What was always interesting is it didn’t matter if I knew the person, I didn’t know the person or they were completely anonymous, they didn’t know each other and they never knew I was talking to anyone else. They always assumed I was the only person they were talking to, so their stories and claims, all similar in nature, seemed almost impossible to be coordinated.
Every day, and I am being literal here, everyday I received tips or people wanting to expose an athlete for something. Sometimes it is trivial, sometimes it is serious. When a big story breaks, I always hear from people from both sides trying to give their opinion or evidence to shed light on the situation.
I have done this for over 11 years. I choose my words carefully. I don’t just say things to say things, or just to have a hot take. If anything, I am extremely neutral on almost everything, so, when I tell you I am certain that Derrick Rose was being extorted by his accuser, I am saying it with full confidence as someone who has followed this case closely for over a year.
That “heads up” was someone telling me that the accuser was about to leak her lawsuit where she claims she was gang raped by Rose and his two friends to TMZ in the hopes it would get some national attention. Within hours it was indeed up on TMZ.
I was familiar with the accuser because we were aware of her relationship with Derrick Rose and other athletes. Any time there is a rape accusation no matter if it is civil or criminal it should be taken seriously. Besides murder and child molestation, there isn’t a more heinous crime than rape. Any man that rapes a woman should be thrown under the jail and frankly never get out if I had my say on the matter.
Sexual assaults are vastly under-reported and many victims are afraid to come forward for fear of being blamed for being assaulted, or they are just too traumatized and emotionally broken to tell anyone.
Just because you dated someone or some may see your lifestyle as promiscuous doesn’t mean you can’t be raped. Just because you date athletes or entertainers doesn’t mean you can’t be raped. No really does mean no regardless of the situation or reputation.
I took the accuser’s claim very seriously, but a couple of things stood out immediately. The first was she didn’t go to the police. She chose to sue Rose. The second was that she waited two years to do so.
I can understand that with any traumatic event it may take time to become strong enough to speak out on it, but if someone raped you and you truly wanted them to pay for their crimes, why wouldn’t you want them to be in jail?
Even if Rose lost the case he still is going to be rich. He still is going to play in the NBA. It would hurt his pockets some, but it wasn’t going to put him where he needed to be if he was truly a rapist and that is in jail.
The accuser says she didn’t know the difference between a criminal and civil charge. That is one of the many lies that the accuser would tell. Even if that was true, her attorneys would have alerted her immediately to the difference. Eventually Ms. Los Rios would file a criminal charge, but that was just window dressing because her motivation from the beginning was the money.
As I researched the claim before knowing much about what happened about the night in question I received on offer for text messages from the accuser about what she would do when she got her settlement money from Rose (those texts were eventually leaked to Baller Alert). The anonymous person, who likely was the roommate and co-worker of Ms. Los Rios, wanted people to know that Los Rios had plotted out a plan to extort Derrick Rose to get her out of financial situation. Also, Los Rios felt Rose was an easy “mark”, not that bright and could be easily manipulated.
After Rose and the accuser relationship fizzled out, she fell on hard times financially, losing jobs, being close to bankruptcy and dealing with a massive amount debt.
As someone who knew the accuser told me recently.
“It was either going to be Derrick or someone else. This was her way of getting out of the bind she was in. Derrick just had the most money and treated her pretty crappy, so she figured he would settle for a couple of million, which is pennies for him.”
The accuser, who before assuming the identity of a shy in over her head woman, was in reality just one of many IG models who like to be in the company of famous people. She was hoping the settlement from Rose would allow her to get plastic surgery.
Let me reiterate that your lifestyle has nothing to do with being raped. Who you decide who you want to have sex with has nothing to do with being raped.
The issue with the accuser case was why was she trying so hard to hide who she really was.
I spoke to another woman who knows the accuser casually and she had this to say:
“I can’t speak to if she was raped or not, but the person who they are portraying is not the one I know. She was not anonymous at all, she was always looking to take a pic with anyone famous, everyone knows who she is and all her family knew she was dealing with Derrick.
The accuser clearly states that the case is an ends to a mean in these text messages. She needs the money to handle the debts.
This doesn’t sound like emotional distress. This sounds like someone who is expecting a payday and is sorry it had to be done this way but didn’t have any other choice.
As the case got closer to trial, it became more clear that this was an extortion attempt on the accuser part against Derrick Rose. We received tons of information about the accuser that was in stark contrast to the what she was presenting on the media tour she went on before the trial started. This is how the media can be a powerful tool for manipulating and poisoning public opinion.
You often hear the term “victim blaming” when you in essence blame the victim for causing their own crime. I don’t think people should do that, but what happens when the alleged victim, under a cloak of secrecy, is able to bash their accuser without the benefit of a judge and with the accused not being able to defend themselves? Sadly, often times media isn’t about what is right. It is about what generates the most buzz. I don’t knock the media for that, because I do it as well, but don’t pretend you are doing it to be fair.
However, the premise of the accuser media tour made no sense at all. She claimed she wanted to be anonymous because she didn’t want to be ostracized from her family who would look down on her for engaging in these activities with Rose.
First, that was a lie. Her family and friends knew, and, secondly, if you want things to be as private as possible, why go to the media?
The answer is simple. You go to the media to control the narrative. You paint Derrick Rose as a sexual deviant and yourself as a saint that was taken advantage of.
A woman who traveled with the accuser thought the whole thing was comical.
“She was getting flown out before Derrick Rose and after Derrick Rose. The person in those interviews isn’t the person I partied with. If he raped her I hope he gets what he deserves, but I can only say the person she is trying to pretend to be isn’t real.”
The media ate the story up, painted Rose as a monster and the accuser as a clear victim. But then the trial happened….
Flip the page to see how the accuser was exposed at trial.
