Three More Women Allege Dustin Hoffman Sexually Abused Them -- One Claiming Hoffman Exposed Himself to Her When She Was 16 Years Old

Demons.

Cori Thomas was in high school when she says Dustin Hoffman exposed himself to her in a hotel room. Melissa Kester was a recent college graduate when Hoffman allegedly sexually assaulted her while recording audio for the film "Ishtar." A third woman, who asked to remain anonymous, said that Hoffman assaulted her in the back of a station wagon and manipulated her into a subsequent sexual encounter that left her traumatized.

Here's Thomas' story. Does this remind you of anyone else's MO?

Thomas was 16 years old and a high-school classmate of Hoffman's daughter Karina at the United Nations International School in New York when she met the actor in 1980. An aspiring actor, she had spent a Sunday afternoon with Karina and Hoffman walking in Manhattan...

"This was at first one of the greatest days of my life," she said. "One of my idols was spending time with me and talking with me respectfully."

Thomas' parents -- her father was the U.N. ambassador from Liberia -- were supposed to pick her up at the restaurant. But, according to Thomas, Hoffman suggested that the three of them wait at the hotel where he was staying and leave a note for Thomas' parents with the maitre d’ saying they had gone to the hotel. After the three arrived at Hoffman’s hotel room, "Either Karina or Dustin suggested that [Karina] should go home" to Hoffman and [his wife's] house nearby, Thomas said, "because it was a school night and she had homework. So she left, and I was left in the hotel room with him alone."

Shortly after Karina departed, according to Thomas, Hoffman went to the restroom. She heard the shower turn on. "I was just sitting there waiting for my parents," Thomas said.

After several minutes, "He came out of the bathroom with a towel at first wrapped around him, which he dropped," Thomas said."“He was standing there naked. I think I almost collapsed, actually. It was the first time I had ever seen a naked man. I was mortified. I didn't know what to do. And he milked it. He milked the fact that he was naked. He stood there. He took his time."

Hoffman eventually put on a robe and sat on the bed, according to Thomas, who said that he then asked her to massage his feet. She complied.

"I didn't know what to do in the circumstance," she said. "I didn't know that I could say no, so I did it. And he kept telling me, 'I'm naked. Do you want to see?'" Thomas said that she pretended not to hear Hoffman as he made suggestive comments to her.

"What saved me was that the phone rang, and it was my mother downstairs to pick me up," Thomas said. "So I left."

Previously, a woman came forward to say that Dustin Hoffman had repeatedly felt up her ass and made crude sexual propositions and suggestions to her -- when she was a 17 year old senior in high school. And he was, you know, not 17.

She also said that Hoffman asked for a footrub -- which she gave him, even thought she didn't want to. Because she was an intern in the play Hoffman was starring in, and because, probably, kids are just not really psychologically ready to contradict or refuse adults' requests. Kids have been told all their lives to do as their elders say (with the exception of people handing out candy from the backs of vans), and they go through a process of really becoming an adult -- and seeing adults as peers, not elders to be respected unconditionally -- in their later teen years and early 20s.

The second woman describes an even more serious violation. She was a recent college graduate, so age is not really an issue, but the behavior here is... well, straight up sexual assault, and the serious kind.

Hoffman was in a recording booth recording a song for "Ishtar." He was having trouble with the take, and said "Send Melissa [Kester] in here."

He started hugging her when singing, on the pretext, I guess, that this was helping him sing.

Then it got bad.

"And as he's doing that, he literally just stuck his fingers down my pants," Kester said. "He put his fingers inside me. And the thing I feel most bad about is I didn’t know what to do. I just stood there. I just froze in the situation like 'Oh my god, what is happening?' It's shocking when that happens to you."

Kester said that she made an effort not to react for fear that her boyfriend or the other man in the control room would know what was happening. She estimated that Hoffman kept his fingers inside her for 15-20 seconds, until he finished the take. Then she moved away from him.

Actresses are reportedly planning to wear all black at this year's Golden Globes, to protest sexual harassment, and I can't say I begrudge them this protest.

Many of you have probably seen this, but check out the surprise cameo at the end of this Today show clip making light of sexual harassment.

posted by Ace at 07:13 PM

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