Credibility | EP 6 | Saskia's Story

During their divorce trial, Mike’s legal team tries every trick in the book to make the court doubt Saskia’s story. Content Warning for tech-enabled sexual abuse, nonconsensual intimate image distribution, mental health struggles, chronic illness, rape, and litigation trauma. Find Deborah Tuerkheimer's book Credible: Why We Doubt Accusers and Protect Abusers here https://www.deborahtuerkheimer.com/book-credible-deborah-tuerkheimer. If you would like to reach out to the Betrayal Team, email us at [email protected] mailto:[email protected]. Follow us on Instagram @betrayalpod https://www.instagram.com/betrayalpod/?hl=en and @glasspodcasts https://www.instagram.com/glasspodcasts/. Follow our newsletter and join the Betrayal community at betrayal.substack.com. https://betrayal.substack.com/welcome For resources on sexual violence, visit rainn.org/betrayal http://www.rainn.org/Betrayal?utm_source=partner&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=betrayal_2026&utm_content=web_resource&utm_term=general. You can also get free, confidential, 24/7 support through RAINN’s National Sexual Assault Hotline. Text HOPE to 64673 or call 1-800-656-HOPE. Every state has a domestic violence coalition, and many counties also have resources available. If you’re looking for help, go onto your county’s website to see what resources are available locally, or search the web for your state’s domestic violence coalition. See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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• 2:36Speaker 00

  Mike Levin Good pled guilty to just one count of second degree rape. He took a plea deal that meant he would only serve 18 months in prison. By the time of his sentencing hearing, the one you heard last episode, the judge's hands were tied. But she had watched those chatterbait videos, and she was sure of what she saw.

• 3:00Speaker 04

  It was clear to me that Ms. Inwood was comatose. Not asleep, but comatose. Unconscious. Absolutely.

• 3:12Speaker 00

  Any technicalities in the law didn't matter. The videos spoke for themselves. To Judge Jill Cummins, this was rape.

• 3:21Speaker 04

  You are a predator to Ms. Inwood. And I completely understand it. The damage done to her is probably irreparable.

• 3:33Speaker 04

  Do you understand that by pleading guilty this morning, you are waiving or giving up that presumption of innocence?

• 3:39Speaker 05

  Yes, I do.

• 3:40Speaker 04

  Do you still want to plead guilty this morning?

• 3:42Speaker 05

  I do, Your Honor.

• 3:43Speaker 04

  Okay, are you pleading guilty today, sir, because you are in fact guilty?

• 3:47Speaker 05

  Yes, Your Honor. Of the one count.

• 3:50Speaker 00

  You'd think that would have been the end of it. But for Saskia, things were about to get much worse. Mike was just getting started.

• 4:13Speaker 00

  I'm Andrea Gunning and this is Betrayal, Season 5. Episode 6. Credibility. Mike's guilty plea marked the end of his criminal proceedings. But his sentencing hearing... Wouldn't be his last time in court. It wouldn't be Saskia's either. For a year, the criminal matter took center stage. But the whole time, there was another case playing out. Saskia and Mike's divorce. We're going to rewind a bit to before Mike's plea deal. Before he was even charged with a crime. It was November 1st, 2018. Just four days after Saskia discovered the videos of her being sexually assaulted

• 4:58Speaker 00

  and went to the police. On that day, Saskia was back at the courthouse, finalizing her protective order. But before she could leave the building...

• 5:07Speaker 06

  I got served the divorce papers.

• 5:10Speaker 00

  At first, having those papers in hand was a relief. She wanted a divorce as quickly as possible. But as Saskia sat in the courthouse lobby, reading the documents Mike sent, she realized this wasn't just any divorce filing.

• 5:26Speaker 06

  He was actually saying that I was complicit in all this and I knew about chatterbait and it's pages and pages of allegations that him and I were a team coming together.

• 5:40Speaker 00

  Just four days after Saskia realized what Mike was doing to her. Four days after Mike left the house. He filed for divorce. On the grounds of cruelty. Saskia's cruelty. Towards him.

• 5:57Speaker 00

  Mike said that Saskia's allegations that he raped her, secretly videotaped her, and posted nude images of her without her knowledge were all false. Saskia was making it all up. The divorce complaint reads, "The parties would spend evening time posting and watching other couples doing the same. This was a regular activity that the parties engaged in openly. These acts were all consensual."

• 6:27Speaker 06

  To get this divorce complaint just floored me. I knew that this was gonna be really ugly.

• 6:35Speaker 00

  These divorce proceedings were completely different than the criminal case Mike was about to face. That case was the state of Maryland versus Mike Levin Good. It was the state's job to prove Mike's guilt. This divorce case was Mike Levin Good versus Saskia Inwood.

• 6:53Speaker 06

  It really felt like I was the one on trial.

• 6:57Speaker 00

  Mike could have gone for a no-fault divorce. Instead, he was determined to take Saskia down. And this path had a lot to offer him. His criminal trial hadn't taken place yet. So the divorce was a bargaining chip. Saskia thinks that Mike was using the divorce case to get her to back down and make his criminal troubles disappear.

• 7:21Speaker 06

  I think that he assumed that I would accept some kind of deal for alimony in exchange for not testifying. It would be easy to throw some cash my way and this would all go away.

• 7:34Speaker 00

  Saskia could have used that money. She was dipping into her 401K just to pay her divorce attorney. But that kind of deal, she'd never accept.

• 7:45Speaker 06

  If the condition is that I don't testify, there's no way. I don't care. I'll be destitute. We're gonna follow through with this.

• 7:59Speaker 00

  The criminal proceedings went ahead with Saskia as an active participant in the case. But even after Mike pled guilty, even after the criminal matter was closed, he charged ahead with the divorce on the grounds of cruelty. Saskia wanted a divorce too, but like I said earlier, this was no typical divorce. Mike was saying Saskia was a liar and there was a lot at stake. If a judge believed him, Saskia could owe Mike, her rapist, tens of thousands of dollars. She could even be charged with false reporting or sued for defamation. In this case, there were lengthy depositions, requests for documents.

• 8:44Speaker 06

  And then in January of 2021, the divorce actually went to trial.

• 8:49Speaker 00

  This is extremely rare. Only about 5% of divorce cases make it to trial. It was the middle of COVID, so much of the trial took place over Zoom. Saskia sat at her kitchen table, staring at Mike through her screen.

• 9:06Speaker 06

  He was sitting there in an orange jumpsuit after pleading guilty to rape.

• 9:11Speaker 00

  At this point, Mike had been convicted. But in spite of that, at this divorce trial, Mike would claim he was innocent. That's why he was so determined to see this case through. You see, Mike couldn't win his freedom. Through his plea, he had waived much of his right to an appeal. But convincing this new judge that Saskia was lying could help him clear his name. If he won the divorce, he could have an official document that proved Saskia made the whole thing up. A document he could take to employers, friends, and family to say, this is what really happened. The divorce judge saw the truth.

• 9:54Speaker 00

  On the surface, the divorce trial was all about money, as most divorces are. Who'd get the house, the cars? But really, the trial rested on who the judge believed. Mike or Saskia?

• 10:10Speaker 06

  Mike looked very arrogant and cocky and had no emotion or feeling. I think he thought that it would be just a wash.

• 10:20Speaker 00

  When Mike and his attorney opened their case, their strategy was clear: turn the spotlight off Mike and onto Saskia. Their goal was to undermine Saskia's credibility. But what does that really mean? Well, they would have to prove she wasn't believable. They'd introduce patterns of behavior, aspects of her character that would show she wasn't a reliable narrator. How would they do this? By saying she'd lost her mind.

• 10:50Speaker 07

  She was very depressed. She was unable to get to work. "I'm depressed. I can't take it. I can't work. Work is stressing me out. The kids are stressing me out. Life is stressing me out."

• 11:02Speaker 00

  This is the courtroom audio from the divorce trial. That's Mike's real voice you just heard. And calling out Saskia's anxiety and depression wasn't the only way he tried to undermine her credibility. He also talked a lot about her use of drugs and alcohol.

• 11:19Speaker 07

  She drank to get them out. There was, like, a lot of her fart more than mine. It very quickly snowballed into seven, eight, nine drinks. She also received Adderall from a friend. When she starts drinking, she doesn't stop.

• 11:37Speaker 00

  All of this was to introduce doubt about Saskia. Saskia's lawyer objected to a lot of this testimony, arguing that Mike's side was trying to enter character evidence unfairly. But the judge allowed Mike to continue.

• 11:54Speaker 06

  I felt like I was in the Twilight Zone. The fact that the judges were even listening to these things was blowing my mind.

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• 16:04Speaker 00

  When Saskia and Mike's divorce trial began, he was zooming in from jail, and his legal strategy was to discredit Saskia.

• 16:12Speaker 07

  She was very depressed. There was, don't you, on her fart more than mine. When she starts drinking, she doesn't stop.

• 16:21Speaker 00

  Saskia sat through hours and hours of this testimony, listening to Mike drag out every time she drank too much and every time she couldn't get out of bed. It wasn't that these moments hadn't occurred. It was that Mike was using them to say Saskia was responsible for everything that happened to her. He was telling the story of the worst period of her life. But in this story, it was all her fault. She was the one causing chaos.

• 16:50Speaker 06

  These things were so dehumanizing and so dismissive of what I had been through and my pain.

• 16:59Speaker 00

  I have to admit, it's hard for me to listen to Mike make this argument without feeling angry. Mike knew her family's mental health history, and how Saskia was determined to remain stable, to not walk the same path as her dad. Saskia thought Mike was on her team. And yet, Mike had been exploiting her mental illness, her use of alcohol and drugs, for years. Saskia's friend Heather put it best:

• 17:28Speaker 06

  "It was to his advantage to keep her in this drunken, drugged-up, bad mental health state, because the more vulnerable she became, the easier it became for him to take advantage of her."

• 17:43Speaker 00

  But as Mike testified and his attorney spoke, his culpability faded into the background. He zeroed in on her behaviors, her imperfections, to show that she shouldn't be trusted, and even, that she was to blame. I want you to hear Mike's account of October 27, 2018, the night of the Halloween party, the night Saskia saw what was on Mike's computer screen. The audio isn't perfect, so listen closely. Here's his story of that night.

• 18:16Speaker 07

  We'd been out of the party, in the hall. We were both drunk, and ended up looking at Chatterbait's website.

• 18:30Speaker 00

  When they got home, they went onto Chatterbait, the camming website. But just as they were logging on...

• 18:37Speaker 07

  She got up and wanted it off, so turned it off, went to bed, and that was it for the evening.

• 18:47Speaker 07

  The next morning, she was very, very agitated, wanted to look at the website, which we did. And then it became very focused on my use of pornography, meaning looking at the website without her. And then we became very... Emotional, and started saying all kinds of things. And that's at the point where she stood there in front of the dresser and she looked at him and she said, you know, "I now know what you're doing." And it was just such a shock and out of nowhere. It just completely forced me.

• 19:30Speaker 07

  That moment is when I realized that it was going on here.

• 19:36Speaker 00

  In Mike's memory, he and Saskia were at a party. They were both drunk, looked at a website. The next day, Saskia went crazy on him, out of the blue. There could only be one explanation for all of this. Saskia was mentally ill.

• 19:55Speaker 00

  In court, this strategy is often effective. It plays on misconceptions we all have about what it means to be a rape victim.

• 20:05Speaker 00

  If you've watched any crime show or any courtroom drama, you're probably familiar with the character of the perfect victim. As sure as I live and breathe, William Harris is the man who raped me in that alley. Think of Law & Order SVU. There's the perpetrator, the bad guy. And then, there is an innocent victim. She's written to be brilliant, beautiful, and beyond reproach. I tried to get away, but I couldn't. He just left me there. Storytellers love this archetype. The protagonist is clear, and audiences love it too. We know exactly who to root for. There's no room for doubt.

• 20:47Speaker 06

  The problem is that most victims don't behave the way this imaginary, perfect victim behaves.

• 20:56Speaker 00

  That's Deborah Tuerkheimer, a professor at Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law.

• 21:02Speaker 06

  I am a former prosecutor, and I handled cases involving...

• 21:08Speaker 01

  Special victims.

• 21:10Speaker 00

  Deborah wrote a book called Credible: Why We Doubt Accusers and Protect Abusers. She's an expert on sexual violence. She says the perfect victim character doesn't just live on screen. She's the benchmark, the standard that all rape victims are judged against. In the courts, in circles of friends, everywhere.

• 21:31Speaker 01

  The perfect victim standard includes misconceptions about how victims behave and how they ought to behave before, during, and after the abuse. Before, there ought to be no drinking, no drug use.

• 21:55Speaker 00

  And Saskia, as we know, was on a lot of substances when she was raped.

• 22:01Speaker 01

  During the abuse, the perfect victim fights. She fights back. She fights hard.

• 22:06Speaker 00

  But Saskia was knocked out.

• 22:09Speaker 01

  And then afterwards, the perfect victim, she's able to recall with precision every single detail of what happened.

• 22:19Speaker 00

  Which, again, Saskia couldn't.

• 22:24Speaker 00

  In every way, Saskia failed to rise to the perfect victim standard. The reality is, most victims do.

• 22:34Speaker 01

  It's unfair to impose a set of rules that, for the most part, can't be followed and aren't followed.

• 22:42Speaker 00

  And yet, the rules remain, and they serve abusers like Mike. Because when victims aren't perfect victims, we can write them off. And we can turn them into other characters.

• 22:54Speaker 01

  The regretful woman. So someone who had consensual sex and then decided it was a mistake. And so is now.

• 23:03Speaker 00

  "Crying rape." "The gold digger." "Someone who is making this up because she wants money." And then, there's the hysterical woman. Someone who just really doesn't know what's going on and doesn't have a firm grasp of reality. It's one of the oldest and most effective ways to discredit a victim. To make the judge question their sanity and doubt what happened to them. Here's Alice Paray, Mike's attorney, from the divorce trial.

• 23:37Speaker 07

  What did you see that makes you believe that she was struggling? She was very depressed. She was unable to get help for work many, many times. She was struggling to take care of the kids. As Inwood says, "I'm feeling like shit." How often would she tell you something like that? So many times, I could not even count. And were there any particular reasons why she felt like shit? Because I'm anxious, I'm depressed, I can't take it, I can't work. Work is stressing me out, the kids are stressing me out, life is stressing me out.

• 24:16Speaker 00

  By Mike's account, Saskia wasn't composed, or stable, or credible. She was a woman in the midst of a breakdown. Her word couldn't and shouldn't be trusted. She had to have lost touch with reality because, according to Mike, he and Saskia were camming together, having sex on camera all the time.

• 24:39Speaker 07

  How many times have the two of you cammed on Chatabate?

• 24:47Speaker 07

  You know, two to three dozen times.

• 24:52Speaker 07

  And how many times had you observed other people camming on Chatabate? Three, four dozen times. It's like they came extremely adventurous, with not a lot of limits. There were no boundaries. That was something that we had not experienced previously in any relationship.

• 25:13Speaker 00

  But Mike wasn't asking the judge to take his word on all this. His divorce attorney, Alice Paray, said she could prove it. She had a plan.

• 25:23Speaker 07

  I would like to really admit all of the pictures and all of the videos because I think the how much of them is relevant to my client's case.

• 25:32Speaker 00

  And when Alice said "all," she wasn't just talking about the videos from the criminal trial, the ones Detective Ruhl recovered from 2017 and 2018.

• 25:42Speaker 07

  There are hundreds of photographs, hundreds of videos, and they take place over the course of years and years, six or seven or more years.

• 25:51Speaker 00

  There was more evidence, much more. And Alice claimed it would show Saskia consented to everything, every sexual act, every video.

• 26:01Speaker 07

  What's happened is the defendant has, under oath in pleadings and requested responses to admissions, just denied everything, right? Never posted a picture, never participated in videos. And you're saying this never happened and there is a picture of it in living corridor, video of it in moving motion. It's relevant.

• 26:27Speaker 00

  And according to Alice, it would show that Saskia was not to be believed.

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• 29:04Speaker 00

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  She'd throw things, wander, and started hoarding. Mom's Alzheimer's was already so hard. But then we found out she had agitation that may happen with dementia due to Alzheimer's disease. And that was a different kind of difficult. So we asked her doctor for more help.

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• 30:45Speaker 00

  In the criminal trial, there were about 30 videos recovered from Chatterbait. These videos were the key to prosecuting and convicting Mike. But in the divorce trial, Mike said he never raped Saskia or took images of her without her consent. She agreed to all of it. And to back that up, he said that he and Saskia often made pornography together.

• 31:09Speaker 05

  Which was done over the course of seven years to the tune of over 200 photographs and videos.

• 31:16Speaker 00

  200 photographs and videos. His divorce attorney, Alice Paray, seemed confident.

• 31:22Speaker 04

  The evidence will convince the court that she was a willing participant in these matters.

• 31:29Speaker 00

  While working on this episode, we reached out to Alice Paray. She declined to comment.

• 31:38Speaker 00

  In these additional images, it wasn't just that Saskia's eyes were open, as we've talked about in previous episodes. Alice claimed that in lots of instances, Saskia was awake, and she was posing and performing for the camera. If Saskia was saying she'd never consented, she was lying. Or she was delusional.

• 32:04Speaker 00

  From the early days of reporting this season, I knew that there were some pictures Mike took of Saskia consensually. Saskia was open about that with us and with detectives, too. The kids would be out of the house and they'd be drinking, having a good time. Then Mike would pull out his phone. You heard about one of these incidents in episode one.

• 32:26Speaker 06

  I remember one time he took a picture of me and showed me how good my butt looked or something like that. And I explicitly asked him, what are you doing with that picture? And he's like, well, of course I'm going to erase it. I would never show it to anybody.

• 32:41Speaker 00

  But she can only remember this happening a handful of times. Mike said he had 200 photographs and videos. And most of these images?

• 32:51Speaker 06

  I don't remember taking them and I never knew of their existence.

• 32:57Speaker 00

  All of this brings up another painful truth about rape cases. No matter the corroboration, no matter the amount of prosecutors, family members, and experts standing behind a victim.

• 33:09Speaker 02

  There's an initial default to doubt that is sort of culturally ingrained in us.

• 33:16Speaker 00

  That's law professor Deborah Tuerkheimer again. She says doubt is built into the crime of rape.

• 33:23Speaker 02

  It's really difficult in the criminal setting to get past that very high standard of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. And that's true of every crime, but it's especially true of rape.

• 33:37Speaker 02

  Historically, there were special instructions that were given to juries that said, you should be even more cautious about convicting in this case because accusers are so untrustworthy. Now those formal instructions are Given, but we still have a default to doubt when someone comes forward.

• 34:01Speaker 00

  That's true, even in a case like this, where there's so much evidence.

• 34:05Speaker 02

  Even sometimes when it's on video, right? There are questions of interpretation.

• 34:12Speaker 00

  No judge or jury can turn back the clock to be in the room at the time a rape happened. And no one can get into the minds or bodies of the people involved.

• 34:23Speaker 01

  And that's also a challenge for us as reporters.

• 34:26Speaker 00

  That's my producer, Kaitlin Golden.

• 34:28Speaker 01

  We can't go back in time. And so in understanding this story, the only thing we can do is rely on the evidence that is available to us.

• 34:39Speaker 00

  When it comes to images like these, attorneys will always make arguments of what was really going on. But our team didn't understand the degree to which these were just arguments, until we saw the images for ourselves.

• 34:56Speaker 00

  After months of reporting, we finally got access to the case files from the divorce and the criminal case. We saw the kinds of photos we heard so much about from Mike's attorney, ones where Saskia's eyes were open. One in particular has stuck with us.

• 35:14Speaker 01

  I remember the first time I saw that photo and I had to immediately close my laptop because, I mean, it's so hard to describe as anything other than horrific. Like, she's not there.

• 35:29Speaker 00

  No, no. She isn't there. I hate even describing it, but the only way I could describe what I saw is it's like a corpse with her eyes open. It's really upsetting. So when I look at that photo, I think, of course, she doesn't remember this.

• 35:48Speaker 01

  Yeah. And the idea that images like this where her eyes are open or being

• 35:56Speaker 00

  To say that she was awake and consented to everything is so disturbing. Seeing this image, it felt clearer than ever. What happened to Saskia is real. It matters. And Mike, not Saskia, is to blame.

• 36:19Speaker 00

  But in the divorce trial back in 2021, there was only one person that needed to be convinced of all this. That was the judge. And Saskia was unsure what she'd make of these images.

• 36:32Speaker 06

  I knew that I wasn't going to be given the benefit of the doubt.

• 36:36Speaker 00

  Before Mike's attorney could show the videos, the judge asked to review the content herself. She stepped into her chambers to watch in private. As everyone waited for the judge to return, Saskia sat in her kitchen staring at Mike through her screen. The man who'd hurt her was now in jail. He was just a little box on Zoom. And yet, he had the power to make her feel so small. He was the one behind bars. But the judge was deliberating over Saskia's actions. Her character.

• 37:11Speaker 06

  It felt ridiculous and absurd and dehumanizing that I had to go through that. But I also knew that I just had to get through it.

• 37:20Speaker 00

  Saskia knew the truth. The truth is always the best defense. She just hoped the judge would see the truth too.

• 37:29Speaker 00

  After a brief recess, the judge returned.

• 37:32Speaker 06

  So I have gone through the additional videos. And it looks as though Ms. Inwood knows she, at points, that pictures are being taken. And I'm not sure about knowing she's being videotaped because I don't think I saw anything that expressly shows that. So this could very well be a situation where, you know, consenting couple agree to take pictures of each other. And I don't think that that is going to challenge Ms. Inwood's credibility.

• 38:06Speaker 04

  But I do believe that Mr. Levin Good's attorney should have some opportunity to examine her about that.

• 38:19Speaker 00

  The judge couldn't say for sure that Saskia did or did not know she was being filmed, or whether she knew this content was being shared. So she asked the officers of the court to turn around. And Mike's attorney, Alice Paray, pulled up the evidence. She wanted to show Saskia the videos and make her answer for them in front of everyone. Saskia looked at the video on her screen. Despite what Alice said, this was a video of her being violated, a video that was now being shown to a room full of strangers.

• 38:54Speaker 06

  It made me feel like a fool. It made me feel like less than a person.

• 39:03Speaker 00

  The whole time, she couldn't stop thinking about Mike.

• 39:07Speaker 06

  It's heartbreaking to think that he put everybody through that just so that he could get away with humiliating me.

• 39:14Speaker 00

  With Saskia on the stand, the judge let Mike's attorney, Alice Paray, proceed.

• 39:22Speaker 00

  Ms. Enwood, do you recall this video?

• 39:24Speaker 05

  No, I don't. Do you recall when it was taken? Objection. She just said no, she doesn't recall.

• 39:32Speaker 06

  How rude.

• 39:35Speaker 04

  Ma'am, do you recall when this video was taken?

• 39:39Speaker 06

  No, because I don't recall the video.

• 39:42Speaker 00

  The attorneys fought back and forth on objections and relevance as Saskia just sat there.

• 39:48Speaker 06

  It was so re-traumatizing to have to defend myself. It's dehumanizing to have your life whittled down to that and to have people talking about things that are affecting your life and you can't do anything. You're just sitting there helpless, having to listen to it. And it's something I wouldn't wish on anyone.

• 40:07Speaker 00

  Alice continued cross-examining Saskia for just a couple more minutes, asking Saskia if she posed for pictures for Mike. And then the judge popped in.

• 40:18Speaker 04

  You go ahead, Ms. Paray. Anything else you want to ask?

• 40:21Speaker 00

  No.

• 40:22Speaker 04

  No other questions of Ms. Enwood?

• 40:25Speaker 00

  None.

• 40:25Speaker 07

  I will save my time for Mr. Levin. All right, all right. Any, she didn't ask much. Any redirect? No, Your Honor. All right, thank you. Okay.

• 40:37Speaker 00

  Alice spent her remaining time questioning Mike again. Before long, she ran out of time. Both sides closed their cases.

• 40:48Speaker 00

  In the weeks that followed, Saskia waited and waited for the divorce decision. She wasn't expecting any kind of big win. She just wanted those papers in hand.

• 40:59Speaker 06

  I had no faith in the justice system anymore. I just wanted it to be over. I was already so disheartened about everything and not hopeful at all. It was like I was waiting for the time to run out. Everything was just getting in the way of me just being divorced from this monster. I wanted nothing more than to be divorced and be able to move on and I could really say that this is not my husband. This is a monster who was posing as my husband and now he's totally gone.

• 41:37Speaker 00

  Finally, a few months later, the judge released her decision. We're going to have a producer read part of it for you. And remember, Mike is the plaintiff here. Saskia is the defendant. The judge wrote:

• 41:51Speaker 06

  This court credits defendant's testimony and expressly discredits plaintiff's testimony.

• 41:57Speaker 00

  In other words, she didn't believe Mike. She believed Saskia.

• 42:04Speaker 06

  Plaintiff attempted to convince this court that defendant was aware of the site and aware that she was being sexually penetrated and otherwise manipulated by the plaintiff. The court is unconvinced. The evidence revealed defendant has struggled during the party's marriage and before with addiction and mental health issues, making

• 42:24Speaker 00

  Her particularly vulnerable to mistreatment by someone she trusted. Defendant learned, only after very personal images were broadcast to the world on the internet, that she was married to someone whom she could not trust. The plaintiff betrayed his spouse in the worst type of way. He then lied about it and continued to lie about it.

• 42:46Speaker 00

  Another judge saw through Mike's lies and came to the same conclusion. On paper, she won. But in reality, to Saskia...

• 42:57Speaker 06

  It didn't matter.

• 43:00Speaker 06

  Of course, yes, she found that he was not credible and that I was credible, but it still didn't take away from what I had been through in this divorce and would have been taken away from me.

• 43:13Speaker 00

  It was exactly how Saskia felt after Mike's plea deal. She was told that this was a good outcome for the court system. But it didn't feel that way. Professor Deborah Tuerkheimer says that's often how these cases go.

• 43:28Speaker 01

  Even in the end, if the survivor is found credible and there's that vindication that comes along with it, along the way, the process can be enormously difficult, degrading, even traumatic.

• 43:45Speaker 00

  Saskia was granted a divorce on the grounds of cruelty. The judge wrote... This court can think of few actions that warrant a divorce on this ground, more so than the rape and sexual exploitation that occurred here. But she had to live through two and a half years of proceedings to get there, when he'd already been convicted in criminal court.

• 44:11Speaker 00

  She spent two and a half years defending herself, having to answer for every drink she had, every hospital stay, having all of her vulnerabilities put on display, when Mike had raped her. And this crime isn't unique to Saskia.

• 44:34Speaker 00

  You can see his hands. His wedding ring. And then I realized that I am in these images. On the next episode of Betrayal, we meet other survivors. It has been a real journey for me to get to the point of realizing that it's not my gut that's broken. It's him that's broken.

• 45:07Speaker 00

  For resources on sexual violence, visit rainn.org/betrayal. That's R-A-I-N-N dot org slash betrayal. You can also get free confidential 24/7 support through RAINN's National Sexual Assault Hotline. Just text HOPE to 64673 or call 1-800-656-HOPE. You are not alone. If you would like to reach out to the Betrayal team or want to tell us your story, email us at [email protected]. That is [email protected]. Or follow us on Instagram @betrayalpod.

• 45:47Speaker 00

  To access additional content and to connect with the Betrayal community, join our Substack at betrayal.substack.com. We're grateful for your support. One way to show support is by subscribing to our show on Apple Podcasts. And don't forget to rate and review Betrayal. Five-star reviews go a long way. A big thank you to all of our listeners. Betrayal is a production of Glass Podcasts, a division of Glass Entertainment Group in partnership with iHeart Podcasts. The show is executive produced by Nancy Glass and Jennifer Fason. Hosted and produced by me, Andrea Gunning. Written and produced by Caitlin Golden. Our supervising producer is Carrie Hartman. Our story editor is Monique LaBord.

• 46:32Speaker 00

  Also produced by Ben Fetterman. Associate producers are Olivia Hewitt and Leah Jablow. Production management by Kristin Melchiori. Additional support by Curry Richmond. Our iHeart team is Ally Perry and Jessica Krychek. Audio editing by Tanner Robbins with additional editing and mixing by Matt Dalvecchio. Special thanks to Saskia, her friends and family. And special thanks to Will Pearson and Carrie Lieberman. The trial's theme is composed by Oliver Baines. Music library provided by MyB Music. And for more podcasts from iHeart, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 47:18Speaker 00

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• 48:02Speaker 00

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• 48:47Speaker 00

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• 49:37Speaker 00

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