A man pleaded guilty Friday to sexually assaulting an intoxicated woman in 2016, and then helping his cousin do the same thing, prosecutors said.
Omar Afzali, 29, of Woodbridge, Virginia, pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree sexual abuse: one for his own sexual assault, and one for aiding and abetting the sexual assault his cousin committed. Afzali faces up to 40 years in prison.
The assault took place during the early hours of July 9, 2016, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia said in a statement Friday. The victim met Afzali outside a D.C. nightclub after unsuccessfully trying to hail a cab.
The victim was intoxicated from socializing with her friends earlier that night, and accepted Afzali’s offer for a ride, prosecutors said.
Afzali drove the victim to a hotel on Rhode Island Avenue Northwest. Security footage from the hotel revealed the victim was so incapacitated that, even with Afzali’s assistance, she was struggling to walk. She stumbled and bumped, face first, into a hallway wall.
At the hotel’s front desk, prosecutors said Afzali had to hold the woman up so she wouldn’t fall down as he signed them in. Security footage shows the woman rested her head on the hotel’s front desk and did not lift her head until Afzali pulled her toward the elevators.
Once inside the hotel room, Afzali forced the woman to engage in sexual acts. Prosecutors said Afzali admitted the victim was so incapacitated at the time that she was unable to decline, or even communicate her unwillingness, to have sex.
When Afzali finished raping the victim, he left the hotel and immediately contacted his cousin to tell him about the victim. Afzali then drove to pick up his cousin, drove him back to the hotel and gave him the key to the hotel room where Afzali had left the incapacitated victim.
Afzali’s cousin then went into the hotel room where he also raped the woman. The cousin later testified that, during the assault, the woman was only partially conscious and could barely move.
At the plea hearing, Afzali admitted that both he and his cousin knew the woman was too intoxicated to give consent, or even know what was happening.
The victim has no recollection of the assaults, or of being with either Afzali or his cousin that night. Prosecutors said forensic analysis found both men’s DNA on swabs taken from the woman’s body.
Afzali is scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 18.
