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Forever Accusations

August 8, 2013 permalink

A Massachusetts man says that as a boy his adoptive mother Linda Mayotte forced him into sex. She counters that he was the aggressor and raped her. His sister is exchanging accusations with adoptive father Joseph Mayotte. There is no way to know which of the four versions is correct, but it is certain that this adoption was not a success.

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Woman accused of rape claims adopted son raped her

WORCESTER —

Linda Mayotte had tears in her eyes as she told a jury on Tuesday that she was repeatedly raped by her adopted son, not the other way around.

Mayotte, 49, of 67 Laura Lane, is on trial in Worcester Superior Court along with her husband, Joseph Mayotte, 50, of the same address, as they stand accused of raping their two adopted children.

Both face 26 charges, including multiple counts of statutory rape of a child, rape of a child aggravated by age, indecent assault on a child and incest, among others.

Linda Mayotte testified that her 13-year-old son, adopted from Kazakhstan along with his 8-year-old sister in 2004, began being sexually aggressive toward her in 2005. Earlier in the trial, the now 21-year-old testified she was the one who sexually abused him.

"He wanted me, he wanted to control me," Mayotte said. She said he began by brushing up against her and exposing himself to her, then escalated to asking her to perform sex acts on him. “He stopped asking and started demanding.”

She said eventually she stopped saying no.

"Why bother? It wasn't going to do a damn thing," Mayotte said.

Her defense attorney, Laurel Singer, showed pictures of the boy from the time in question to the jury, revealing him to be taller and heavier than Linda Mayotte.

Mayotte testified she was too scared to tell anyone about the abuse because he had threatened to go to police and say she was raping him.

"We're here, aren't we? This is what I was afraid of," she said. She also said she was worried her other children would be taken away if he was to go to police.

Mayotte testified her son only stopped sexually assaulting her when he found out she was pregnant in 2007. Both sides stipulated earlier in the trial that he was the father of her child.

In 2009, her son reported the abuse to police after Linda Mayotte went to police about jewelry he admittedly stole from her.

At that time, the adopted daughter reported being sexually abused by Joseph Mayotte for nearly five years, from 2004 through 2009. She had previously told friends about the abuse in 2007.

Assistant District Attorney Cheryl Riddle questioned why Linda Mayotte didn't tell her husband, other family members, police, doctors or social workers about the rape she's alleging now.

“You never told anyone in this ‘vast support network’ that your adopted son was raping you?” Riddle asked and Mayotte said no.

Riddle also noted many inconsistencies between Linda Mayotte’s first telling of the alleged rape to police, a video of which was shown earlier in the trial, and her testimony Tuesday.

“None of that was in your statement to Lt. (Tim) LaBrie,” the officer who took Mayotte’s statement, said Riddle.

Contact Lindsay Corcoran at 508-634-7582 or lcorcoran@wickedlocal.com. Follow her on Twitter @LacorcMDN.

Source: Milford Daily News

He said / she said

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