'Scrubs' Co-Executive Producer Held on $5 Million Bond After 18 Sexual Misconduct Charges

Former co-executive producer of ScrubsEric Weinberg, is being held on a $5 million bond after being charged with 18 counts of sexual abuse and assault. According to the Los Angeles Times, on Tuesday, Weinberg, 62, was arrested on charges of raping at least eight women, oral copulation, sexual battery, false imprisonment, assault, and forcible penetration by a foreign object. Police have identified at least eight victims, and investigators are looking for others, LAPD Capt. Kelly Muniz told the Los Angeles Times. Previously, Weinberg had been taken into custody in July for multiple sexual assaults between 2012 and 2019 but was released after posting $3.2 million bail. 

Several victims claim he allegedly coaxed victims into his home, promising to take their photos before raping them while using his Hollywood status as a lure. Among the TV shows Weinberg produced are ScrubsVeronica's ClosetCalifornicationAnger Management, and Men at Work. In a statement, lawyer Micha Star Liberty, who represents some of the women accusing Weinberg, said she was "grateful that the District Attorney has acted in furtherance of accountability. "The significant number of victims and the horrific impact inflicted upon those women will not go un-remediated," she said. "We will not rest until there is justice." Weinberg's lawyer previously called the allegations a "blatant smear campaign." 

LAPD records show that two rape cases against Weinberg were presented to the DA's office in 2014, but the cases were dropped due to lack of evidence, reported Daily Mail. A recent late-reported rape led detectives to open another investigation into Weinberg, LAPD officials told The Times. "It was... this new reported crime that led detectives to the additional victims being identified." According to police, more evidence and witness statements are being sought through a Facebook group created by Weinberg's alleged victims.  

Avian Anderson, 33, a storyboard artist, restaurant manager Kayra Raecke, 22, and artist Claire Wilson, 30, are among the eight women who went public with their allegations. In a Hollywood Reporter interview, Anderson described how Weinberg enticed her with the promise of taking photographs for a personal portfolio. She says he pounced as soon as they were inside his house. While getting dressed after the 2019 encounter, she claimed he told her, "You're not going to go to the police and tell everybody that I raped you, are you?" For three days, Anderson said she didn't bathe to "preserve the dried semen" on her body. Then she went to the police. 

Wilson met Weinberg through the OKCupid dating app in December 2019. After meeting him in a bar, they kissed consensually at his home. Later, she claimed he forced her to perform oral sex on him and then "pinned her down" to perform other sex acts. Raecke alleged Weinberg raped her after he convinced her to let him photograph her in April 2014. "After I had said no so many times, he continued doing what he wanted anyway. I didn't know what else he was capable of – including violence," she told Hollywood Reporter. 'It thought there was a real possibility that I might die there." 

As described in a 2020 declaration, Raecke said Weinberg choked her to nearly passing out. After driving to Planned Parenthood, the woman told staff, "I think I've just been raped," and went to the police. She called Weinberg, who cried on the phone about his children, but did not confess. It is one of the cases the Los Angeles District Attorney's Office decided not to prosecute. 

Weinberg told police that the encounter was consensual, even though Raecke claimed otherwise, and the case was dropped. Other women claimed that Weinberg would follow them in his car, repeatedly approaching them over a year or several months, forgetting that he had already talked to them and been rejected. During his divorce from his wife, Weinberg sought treatment for sex addiction, said Daily Mail.

In 2017 she did not formally file for divorce because she did not want to put it on record that Weinberg was addicted to sex after he was accused of rape. However, after she discovered that he approached a 16-year-old classmate of their son in Starbucks and offered to take pictures of her, she lost any sympathy for him. Weinberg has not commented publicly on the allegations, but in court filings and private conversations, he has said that the women are out to get him, admitted they interacted and even confessed to having "bad judgment." 

If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, you can contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673) or go to rainn.org.

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