Private equity executive raped and tortured women at his Manhattan apartment, prosecutors say

NEW YORK (AP) — A private equity executive turned his New York City apartment into a torture chamber of “grotesque sexual violence," Manhattan prosecutors said Thursday. He is accused of raping six women over five months in a depraved rampage in which he allegedly punched, waterboarded and shocked victims with a cattle prod and kept recordings of the assaults as trophies.

Ryan Hemphill, who remains jailed after his arrest last month, pleaded not guilty to a 116-count indictment charging him with predatory sexual assault and other crimes dating to last October. The 43-year-old, who is also a lawyer, threatened to have victims arrested or disappeared in a bid to keep them silent, prosecutors said.

“The defendant told these survivors that he was untouchable,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said. “The indictment makes clear that he was wrong.”

Hemphill sat quietly in a khaki jail suit, his cuffed hands clutching a cross behind his back, as a prosecutor described his alleged crimes in gruesome detail.

If convicted, Hemphill could spend the rest of his life in prison. He was previously acquitted in 2015 of choking and holding a knife to his ex-girlfriend’s throat after testifying that he enjoyed strangling her during sex.

“We have reason to believe these six victims are only the tip of the iceberg,” Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Mirah Curzer told Judge Ann E. Scherzer.

Hemphill’s apartment, near the Empire State Building, was outfitted with numerous surveillance cameras, and investigators have recovered images showing dozens, if not hundreds, of other women, many of them naked and blindfolded, Curzer said.

Investigators also found hundreds of bullets and high-capacity magazines, and a large amount of drugs, including heroin, cocaine, amphetamines, and fentanyl, prosecutors said.

Hemphill met the six women through websites, including some that specialize in “sugar daddy” arrangements for women seeking wealthy romantic partners, Curzer said.

He told the women he was into role play and dominance and offered them large sums of money in exchange for sex and companionship, though he ended up not paying some of the women or giving them fake cash instead, Curzer said.

As Hemphill got to know the women, he convinced them to confide their past sexual traumas, which he then deliberately reenacted as he assaulted them, Curzer said. He took advantage of some victims' inexperience, the prosecutor said, or crossed boundaries that victims had clearly articulated.

Hemphill is accused of tricking victims into ingesting substances that rendered them unable to fight back, using handcuffs and other restraints on them, wrapping their heads and faces with duct tape, slapping and punching them, and torturing them with a cattle prod and shock collar.

Hemphill kept one victim shackled to a bed for hours while she begged him to let her go, Curzer said.

Hemphill’s alleged conduct is “truly shocking to the conscience,” and he “has made clear that he has no regard for the law or the courts,” Curzer said.

To keep women quiet, Hemphill boasted about connections to law enforcement and organized crime, prosecutors said, and claimed that because the women had accepted offers of money, it was them who would be arrested.

Hemphill is charged with bribing a witness and, according to prosecutors, drew up a contract in which he agreed to pay a woman $2,000 in exchange for dropping a complaint she filed with police. He is also accused of forcing some victims to record videos in which they stated that they had consented to being abused.

“The power imbalance in his predatory acts could not be more clear,” Bragg told reporters. “He wielded his law degree and money as both sword and shield, coercing and silencing survivors.”

The arraignment happened down the hall from disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein’s rape retrial.

Scherzer ordered Hemphill to remain jailed without bail after prosecutors raised concerns that his predicament, combined with his wealth and connections — including a history of philanthropy and family real estate holdings — could give him the means and incentive to flee the country.

Hemphill’s lawyer, a public defender assigned to represent him at least through his arraignment, had urged Scherzer to move him to a rehabilitation facility to deal with substance abuse issues.

Scherzer ruled that, given the fact pattern laid out by prosecutors, “including efforts to dissuade by force and threats to witnesses from testifying against him,” jailing him was the only way to ensure Hemphill would return to court.

Hemphill’s alleged behavior, the judge said, “shows his extent to which he’s willing to go to protect himself from facing these charges."

Ryan Hemphil is escorted from court in New York on Thursday, April 24, 2025, after his arraignment on sexual assault charges. (Curtis Means/Dailymail.com, Pool)

Ryan Hemphil appears in court in New York on Thursday, April 24, 2025, for his arraignment on sexual assault charges. (Curtis Means/Dailymail.com, Pool)

Ryan Hemphil appears in court in New York on Thursday, April 24, 2025, for his arraignment on sexual assault charges. (Curtis Means/Dailymail.com, Pool)

Ryan Hemphil is escorted to court in New York on Thursday, April 24, 2025, for his arraignment on sexual assault charges. (Curtis Means/Dailymail.com, Pool)

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump said Iran wants to negotiate with Washington after his threat to strike the Islamic Republic over its bloody crackdown on protesters, a move coming as activists said Monday the death toll in the nationwide demonstrations rose to at least 544.

Iran had no immediate reaction to the news, which came after the foreign minister of Oman — long an interlocutor between Washington and Tehran — traveled to Iran this weekend. It also remains unclear just what Iran could promise, particularly as Trump has set strict demands over its nuclear program and its ballistic missile arsenal, which Tehran insists is crucial for its national defense.

Meanwhile Monday, Iran called for pro-government demonstrators to head to the streets in support of the theocracy, a show of force after days of protests directly challenging the rule of 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Iranian state television aired chants from the crowd, who shouted “Death to America!” and “Death to Israel!”

Trump and his national security team have been weighing a range of potential responses against Iran including cyberattacks and direct strikes by the U.S. or Israel, according to two people familiar with internal White House discussions who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

“The military is looking at it, and we’re looking at some very strong options,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One on Sunday night. Asked about Iran’s threats of retaliation, he said: “If they do that, we will hit them at levels that they’ve never been hit before.”

Trump said that his administration was in talks to set up a meeting with Tehran, but cautioned that he may have to act first as reports of the death toll in Iran mount and the government continues to arrest protesters.

“I think they’re tired of being beat up by the United States,” Trump said. “Iran wants to negotiate.”

He added: “The meeting is being set up, but we may have to act because of what’s happening before the meeting. But a meeting is being set up. Iran called, they want to negotiate.”

Iran through country's parliamentary speaker warned Sunday that the U.S. military and Israel would be “legitimate targets” if America uses force to protect demonstrators.

More than 10,600 people also have been detained over the two weeks of protests, said the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency, which has been accurate in previous unrest in recent years and gave the death toll. It relies on supporters in Iran crosschecking information. It said 496 of the dead were protesters and 48 were with security forces.

With the internet down in Iran and phone lines cut off, gauging the demonstrations from abroad has grown more difficult. The Associated Press has been unable to independently assess the toll. Iran’s government has not offered overall casualty figures.

Those abroad fear the information blackout is emboldening hard-liners within Iran’s security services to launch a bloody crackdown. Protesters flooded the streets in the country’s capital and its second-largest city on Saturday night into Sunday morning. Online videos purported to show more demonstrations Sunday night into Monday, with a Tehran official acknowledging them in state media.

In Tehran, a witness told the AP that the streets of the capital empty at the sunset call to prayers each night. By the Isha, or nighttime prayer, the streets are deserted.

Part of that stems from the fear of getting caught in the crackdown. Police sent the public a text message that warned: “Given the presence of terrorist groups and armed individuals in some gatherings last night and their plans to cause death, and the firm decision to not tolerate any appeasement and to deal decisively with the rioters, families are strongly advised to take care of their youth and teenagers.”

Another text, which claimed to come from the intelligence arm of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, also directly warned people not to take part in demonstrations.

“Dear parents, in view of the enemy’s plan to increase the level of naked violence and the decision to kill people, ... refrain from being on the streets and gathering in places involved in violence, and inform your children about the consequences of cooperating with terrorist mercenaries, which is an example of treason against the country,” the text warned.

The witness spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity due to the ongoing crackdown.

The demonstrations began Dec. 28 over the collapse of the Iranian rial currency, which trades at over 1.4 million to $1, as the country’s economy is squeezed by international sanctions in part levied over its nuclear program. The protests intensified and grew into calls directly challenging Iran’s theocracy.

Nikhinson reported from aboard Air Force One.

In this frame grab from video obtained by the AP outside Iran, a masked demonstrator holds a picture of Iran's Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi during a protest in Tehran, Iran, Friday, January. 9, 2026. (UGC via AP)

In this frame grab from footage circulating on social media from Iran shows protesters taking to the streets despite an intensifying crackdown as the Islamic Republic remains cut off from the rest of the world in Tehran, Iran, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026.(UGC via AP)

In this frame grab from footage circulating on social media from Iran showed protesters once again taking to the streets of Tehran despite an intensifying crackdown as the Islamic Republic remains cut off from the rest of the world in Tehran, Iran, Saturday Jan. 10, 2026. (UGC via AP)