Massachusetts rape trial begins against attorney once listed as one of People’s top 50 American bachelors

A Massachusetts attorney once named as one of People magazine’s most eligible bachelors faces rape charges, and his trial began Tuesday in Boston.

Gary Zerola, 51, a former prosecutor and lawyer, faces allegations that he raped a 23-year-old woman, putting him behind the bench in the role of defendant, and not attorney.

He has pleaded not guilty to the two rape charges brought against him by the woman, who took the stand on the first day of the trial, according to WFXT Boston 25 News.

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The victim told police she partied with her friends one night in the North End in 2016, and later woke up to Zerola taking her clothes off and assaulting her in his friend’s apartment.

“This was no stranger,” the station reported Assistant District Attorney Thomas Brant as saying. “This was also no consent for what Gary Zerola did to her.”

Zerola’s attorney, Rosemary Scapicchio, on the other hand, reportedly said the victim lied.

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“Plain and simple, she is a liar,” Scapicchio said. “The story you just heard from the commonwealth doesn’t tell half of what happened.”

Zerola previously worked as a district attorney in Essex County for a year, and Suffolk County for two months in 2000.

When the charges were brought against him in 2021, Zerola had been freed on $10,000 bail for allegedly raping another woman in 2016. He pleaded not guilty to that case.

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Prosecutors also said two additional women have claimed Zerola raped them in the 1990s, and he has been acquitted in separate rape and attempted rape cases in Massachusetts. A prior sex assault case against him was also dropped in Florida.

In 2001, Zerola, then 29, was featured in People as one of “America’s Top 50 Bachelors” alongside actors Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.

Zerola was a lawyer and foster care advocate who set up his own law practice following nearly two years as a Massachusetts prosecutor.  

He noted his challenging childhood in an interview, saying he lived in more than 12 foster homes from age 3 through 15.

“Statistically speaking, I should be in debt or in jail because of the upbringing I had,” Zerola told People.