California appeals court upholds Danny Masterson's rape convictions, rejecting Scientology-based appeal

A California appeals court has affirmed Danny Masterson's 2023 conviction on two counts of forcible rape, rejecting the argument from the actor, best known for his role on the Fox sitcom "That '70s Show," that the trial judge was biased against the Church of Scientology and that testimony about the religion's internal practices should never have reached the jury. The 89-page ruling, filed Tuesday, leaves in place a sentence of 30 years to life in state prison.

A three-justice panel of the Second Appellate District, Division Two, of the California Court of Appeal unanimously rejected every claim Masterson raised, including arguments that prosecutors waited too long to charge him, that his trial lawyer was ineffective for not seeking a continuance, and that jurors were improperly asked to weigh Scientology doctrine. Justice Victoria M. Chavez wrote the opinion; Justices Anne Richardson and Stephen Goorvitch concurred. The decision was not certified for publication, meaning it cannot be cited as precedent in future cases, a routine designation for appellate rulings that resolve a single defendant's claims rather than break new legal ground.

A years-long path from mistrial to appeal

Masterson, now 50, was charged in 2020 with raping three women — identified in court papers as J.B., N.T. and C.B. — in incidents at his Hollywood Hills home between 2000 and 2003. All three women were, like Masterson, affiliated with the Church of Scientology at the time. A 2022 trial ended in a mistrial after the jury deadlocked on all three counts. At a second trial in 2023, jurors convicted Masterson of raping J.B. and N.T., deadlocked again on the count involving C.B., and found true an allegation that he had assaulted more than one victim. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Charlaine F. Olmedo sentenced him that September to consecutive terms of 15 years to life on each count.

The appellate opinion recounts in granular detail how Scientology "ethics officers" discouraged the women from going to police. According to the court's summary of trial testimony, one officer directed J.B. to rewrite her internal "knowledge report" about the assault so that it did not describe her as a victim, telling her that being a victim was "a criminal act in Scientology," and barred her from using the word "rape." J.B. reported the assault to the Los Angeles Police Department in 2004, but prosecutors declined to file charges at the time. It was not until 2016, after a second woman reported Masterson to police and additional women came forward, that prosecutors revisited the case; formal charges followed in 2020.

The arguments the court rejected

Much of Masterson's appeal turned on the extensive Scientology-related evidence admitted at trial, which the Church of Scientology International itself sought to challenge in a friend-of-the-court brief arguing that letting jurors hear about internal church policy violated the First Amendment. The panel disagreed, drawing a distinction between asking jurors to judge the truth of a faith's doctrine and simply explaining why the accusers delayed reporting the assaults.

The jury in this case was not asked to determine the truth or falsity of Scientology doctrine or beliefs.

The court likewise found no evidence that Olmedo had shown "any animus or departure from neutrality regarding Scientology" in her rulings or courtroom remarks, and agreed with the trial court that admitting the testimony did not violate the First Amendment, the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine, or the state's evidence rules. Separately, the panel rejected Masterson's claim that the state's 10-year statute of limitations for rape had expired before he was charged, and upheld the trial judge's decision to bar the defense from telling jurors that the accusers had a financial incentive to testify because of a separate, pending civil lawsuit against Masterson over alleged harassment and stalking.

Reaction and what comes next

Masterson's appellate lawyers, Cliff Gardner and Eric Multhaup, said in statements reported by TMZ that they intend to keep fighting the convictions. Gardner argued the panel's decision ignored what he called "extraordinary new evidence" undermining the accusers' accounts. Multhaup, who also represented Masterson on a separate habeas corpus petition that the court denied the same day, criticized the court's "one-paragraph summary" of the prosecution's case, saying the brevity "reflects poorly on the administration of justice." Both lawyers said they would petition the California Supreme Court for review, according to TheWrap, which first obtained a copy of the ruling.

The outcome was also reported by Variety and by The Associated Press, both of which confirmed the panel's unanimous finding that Masterson had failed to show any trial error warranting a new trial. A petition to the state Supreme Court does not guarantee further review; the justices accept only a small fraction of the cases presented to them each year, and the appellate court's opinion, once final, stands as the operative ruling in the meantime.

For now, Masterson remains incarcerated and serving the 30-years-to-life sentence imposed in 2023. The ruling, posted this week to the California Courts' public archive of appellate opinions, runs to 89 pages precisely because it walks through, count by count and claim by claim, how the Church of Scientology's internal "ethics" process intersected with the criminal case against one of its most prominent members. That intersection — evidence that church officials discouraged victims from reporting assaults to police — was not a side issue at trial but, in the appellate panel's telling, central to explaining years of delay before any charges were filed.