Retired NYPD Detective Guilty of Drugging and Raping Woman

Retired NYPD detective convicted of drugging, raping woman at Greenburgh motel
The Journal News by Rebecca Baker - November 24, 2009
rebaker@lohud.com

WHITE PLAINS, NY — A jury convicted a retired New York City police detective of drugging and raping a woman in a Greenburgh motel last year, but acquitted him of kidnapping her from a bar in the Bronx. Jose Arroyo, 47, was found guilty today of two felony counts of rape, for sexually assaulting a physically helpless person who was incapable of consent, and for facilitating a sex crime using drugs. He was also convicted of felony assault for impairing the woman with drugs. Arroyo’s mother began sobbing when she saw her son handcuffed after the verdict. He turned to his mother and other family members and said, “Don’t worry. Love you.” He will be held at the Westchester County jail until his sentencing on Jan. 20. He faces up to 25 years in state prison on the top rape count. Arroyo was convicted of slipping drugs in the drink of a 31-year-old Texas woman at Doyle’s Pub in the Bronx on Nov.—, 2008, rendering her unconscious. He then took her to the Alexander Motel on Tarrytown Road in Greenburgh, where he had sex with her and took 16 photographs of her nude body in various poses. Arroyo then left for his job as a bouncer at a White Plains bar, where he showed her driver’s license to male co-workers as a “before” picture and the nude photohaphs as “after” pictures. The woman, who was in the area visiting her ex-girlfriend, told the jury she woke up the next morning and didn’t know where she was. She grabbed Arroyo’s keys and some of his clothes and ran out of the room. A motel manager called police when he saw her trying to open several different cars. Arroyo, a former Marine who worked as a bouncer in White Plains and used to train and recruit security guards, insisted that he never drugged the woman and that they had consensual sex. During deliberations, the jury asked more than once to watch a security video from Doyle’s Pub, which prosecutors said captured Arroyo spiking the woman’s drink while she was in the ladies’ room, stirring it up and handing her the glass when she returned.