A leaked video clip of LSU student Madison Brooks arguing with her alleged rapists in a car moments before she was fatally struck by a rideshare vehicle was “hurtful and shameful,” her mother’s attorney said.
The footage, taken by one of the men, was released by their defense attorneys to WBRZ last week. The attorneys claim the 29-second clip exonerates their clients.
The video shows Brooks, 19, seated between two men in the back seat on Jan. 15 slurring her words as she says “I’m sorry that I offended you that bad,” telling the man beside her “Get out, get out. I will Uber on my own,” before he stepped out of the car so she could exit.
As she gets out of the car, she can be heard calling the driver, Casen Carver, “gay,” the short clip shows before abruptly ending. Shortly afterward, Brooks was hit by a car and later declared dead at the hospital.
Kerry Miller, who is representing Brooks’ mother, Ashley Baustert, told Fox News that the video was “hurtful and shameful,” and every time the defense releases another video clip to the media it cuts Baustert “like a knife.”
In January, the defense released a short video that showed Brooks running after her alleged attackers after leaving Reggie’s bar and on the way to their car in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
“It’s one thing to defend your clients. It’s another to try the case in the media,” Miller said. “It shows a level of desperation.”
Defense attorneys argue the video shows that Brooks had consensual sex with two of the men and she was not raped.
“Speaking and engaging in conversations, using very vulgar language to the driver of the vehicle,” attorney Ron Haley, who is defending one of the suspects, told WBRZ. “Insulting the driver of the vehicle — implying that the driver of the vehicle is not straight based on him not wanting to engage in certain activities with her. It doesn’t put anyone in the best light, but again, not being put in the best light isn’t the same thing as rape,” said Haley.
However, prosecutors have argued that Brooks was too intoxicated to consent to sex.
Her blood-alcohol content was 0.319% — nearly four times the legal limit at the time of the alleged rape, authorities said.
Kaivon Deondre Washington, 18, Desmond Carter, 17, whose name was just released on Wednesday during a grand jury hearing, were charged with third-degree rape.
Carver, also 18, and a fourth passenger, 28-year-old Everett Lee, were each charged with principle to third-degree rape, meaning they witnessed but did not participate in the sexual assault.
The district attorney’s office is reportedly considering upgrading charges against Carver and Lee as more evidence is presented to the grand jury, Fox reported.
Washington has since been arrested and charged with two more alleged rapes in Livingston Parish in 2020, when he was 16 and the victim was just 12-year-old, and the same area of East Baton Rouge in October 2022 after also meeting his victim at Reggie’s.
The suspects’ defense attorneys claimed they have additional unreleased video evidence from that night that proves their clients’ innocence, including footage that shows Washington and Carter receiving “verbal consent” from Brooks.
Brooks’ cause of death was ruled “multiple traumatic injuries 2nd motor vehicle versus pedestrian collision,” the East Baton Rouge Parish Coroner’s Office said.
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