Before ‘Ivy league’ rapist, Matthew Muller, was jailed 40 years, the woman wrongly dubbed the ‘Gone Girl hoaxer’ describes kidnap ordeal at the hands of Harvard-trained lawyer who took her hostage, drugged and raped her
Denise Huskins, 31,who cops disbelieving dubbed the ‘Gone Girl hoaxer’ described her kidnap ordeal as Matthew Muller took her hostage, drugged and raped her
Addressing the disbarred Harvard educated attorney and ex-Marine in court, Huskins said ‘You treated me like an animal’ victim
Muller abducted Denise and raped her while he held her hostage for two days
He broke into her home before tying up her and boyfriend Aaron Quinn and drugging them. He held them hostage for two days
39-year-old Matthew Muller, who pled guilty last year to kidnapping, Denise and holding her for ransom in March 2015, was sentenced to 40 years in prison, Thursday
Police initially dismissed kidnapping as a ‘Gone Girl hoax’ before apologizing
Her parents wrote to the judge this week asking for the harshest penalty to be imposed on Muller
Matthew Muller was jailed for 40 years for the kidnapping Denise Huskins in 2015
A 31-year-old California woman who was drugged and dragged from her home in a crime so bizarre that police initially thought it was a hoax has told her attacker he treated her ‘like an animal, like a toy’.
Matthew Muller, a disbarred Harvard University educated attorney, was sentenced to serve forty years behind bars behind bars for kidnapping Denise Huskins, and holding her for ransom tin March of 2015.
He could face further sex assault charges.
Huskins described the two days of physical and psychological torture she endured after Muller snatched her from her and her boyfriend’s San Francisco Bay Area home two years ago.
She told her kidnapper: ‘You treated me like an object, a toy, an animal.’
Denise Huskins and Aaron Quinn [Photo center and right] were tied up and drugged when Muller broke into their home in Vallejo in March 2015. They are pictured in a press conference after the abduction
Fighting back tears, during her testimony, Huskins said: ‘I still have nightmares every night. Sleep is not rest for me. It is a trigger.’
She also shared how she had been sexually molested as a child and how the attacks brought back memories of that assault.
You flopped me around the bed like a rag doll..The only way I got through it was to picture that it was Aaron that I was with, and that will haunt me for the rest of my life.
She recounted how Muller made her ‘perform’ when he raped her for a second time.
‘The second time you forced me to kiss you and say things to make it seem like we were a legitimate couple, she told the court.
‘You couldn’t just take my physical body and let me be detached from it, like I was in the first rape as you flopped me around the bed like a rag doll. This second time, you made me perform, ‘let’s pretend like we are with other people, the people we love, to get us through it’, as if this were happening to the both of us.
‘I saw right through all of this, but knew I had to appease you. The only way I got through it was to picture that it was Aaron that I was with, and that will haunt me for the rest of my life. I know you did that on purpose, to leave your mark on me in the most special and intimate moments of my life.’
Her boyfriend, Aaron Quinn, who was bound and drugged during the kidnapping, said he ‘cannot and will not ever be the same’.
Initially, investigators thought her story was a hoax and likened the case to the film ‘Gone Girl’ in which a woman goes missing and then lies about being kidnapped when she reappears.
U.S. District Judge Troy Nunley called the abduction a ‘heinous, atrocious, horrible crime’ as he sentenced Muller, who faced up to life in prison. Prosecutors agreed to recommend 40 years in a plea deal.
In court, Muller said he was ‘sick with shame’ for the ‘pain and horror’ he caused.
Shackled and wearing an orange jail jumpsuit, he looked straight ahead and showed no emotion as he was sentenced.
‘He doesn’t have empathy. I don’t think he’s capable of it,’ Quinn’s mother, Marianne Quinn, said after the sentencing.

Aaron’s mother Marianne Quinn being comforted outside court after the sentencing, Thursday
She said a life sentence would have been better ‘because they never would have to worry about him ever again, but again, he’s going to be in jail for a long, long, long time’.
Defense attorney Thomas Johnson argued for a 30-year sentence, saying his client has been diagnosed as manic and depressive and can be rehabilitated with proper treatment.
‘They want him to be a monster to get to 40 years. Fine. Marginalize mental illness,’ Johnson told the judge sardonically.
He declined comment after the hearing.
Muller used a remote-controlled drone to spy on Huskins and Quinn before he broke into their Vallejo home with a fake gun, tied up the couple and made them drink a sleep-inducing liquid, prosecutors said.
They were blindfolded while Muller played a pre-recorded message that made it seem as if there was more than one kidnapper.
He put Huskins in the trunk of his car, drove her to his home in South Lake Tahoe and held her there for two days before eventually releasing her in her hometown of Huntington Beach.
Investigators said they found videos of Muller arranging cameras in a bedroom and then recording himself twice sexually assaulting his blindfolded victim.
Former attorney Matthew Muller [left], was charged with kidnapping Denise Huskins in 2015. Sexual assault charges may follow.
Prosecutors cited the rapes as one of several aggravating factors justifying a 40-year sentence.
Despite the fact that Mathew Muller assaulted his victim, he was not charged with a sex crime because there is no appropriate federal law. Speaking for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Lauren Horwood, said the defendant could still face state charges for the rape.
El Dorado County Assistant District Attorney James Clinchard said his office now plans to contact the FBI and other law enforcement agencies to see if his office should file charges.
Court documents revealed that Muller, during and after the kidnapping, used an anonymous email address to send messages to a San Francisco reporter claiming that Huskins was abducted by a team of elite criminals who were practicing their tactics.
After her release, Vallejo police called the kidnapping a hoax and erroneously likened it to the book and movie ‘Gone Girl’.
Investigators dropped that theory after Muller was arrested in an attempted robbery at another Bay Area home. Authorities said they found a cellphone that they traced to Muller and a subsequent search of a car and home turned up evidence, including a computer Muller stole from Quinn, linking the disbarred attorney to the abduction.

Cops finally believed Huskins’ story after Muller was arrested in an attempted robbery at another San Francisco Bay Area home
Vallejo police have since apologized. Huskins is suing the city and two police officers, accusing them of defamation and inflicting emotional distress.|
Quinn described yesterday how the home he once loved ‘turned into a prison’ and how his young nieces still check under their beds each night.
‘They’re not checking for a bogeyman,’ he told Muller directly. ‘They’re checking for you.’
Muller, a former Marine, was admitted to practice law in California in 2011, and his state bar profile says he attended Harvard Law School. He lost his law license in 2015 in an unrelated incident.
‘Muller had advantages in life that most people only dream of,’ U.S. Attorney Phillip Talbert said in a statement, ‘yet he used his considerable intelligence to plan and execute the physical assault and psychological torture of two innocent strangers.’
Earlier this week Denise Huskins’ parents told the judge they were outraged Muller will not be sentenced for rape and drugging her.
Aaron Quinn’s mother Marianne addressing the media outside court after the sentencing, Thursday
The victim’s parents Jane Remmele and Mike Huskins wrote letters to U.S. District Judge Troy L. Nunley ahead of yesterday’s sentencing, calling for the harshest sentence possible: ‘A person who kidnapped my daughter is to be sent to prison for just that – kidnapping. My daughter was also drugged, restrained, abused and sexually assaulted. Aaron was drugged and restrained,’ Remmele wrote in the letters included in the federal court file.
‘Should no sentence be imposed for these crimes justice will not have been served. If effect, a free pass will have been given to the felon for these other acts.
‘I have no idea how this is possible and it sickens me as much as anything that has happened in the past two years.’
long time.’
Letter from Huskins’ mom, Jane Remmele to letter to Judge Troy L. Nunley ahead of sentencing requesting the harshest sentence possible to be imposed on Muller
Crime scene: Prosecutors said Muller had used a remote-controlled drone to spy on his victims before breaking into their home in Vallejo [photo] and holding them hostage for two days
‘Public safety requires that he be imprisoned until he is old and weak,’ Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Dean Segal said as he called the crime ‘depraved and egregious.’
Investigators dropped the hoax theory after Muller was later arrested in an attempted robbery at another San Francisco Bay Area home.
Muller, a former Marine, was admitted to practice law in California in 2011, and his state bar profile says he attended Harvard Law School. He lost his law license in 2015 in an unrelated incident.
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