She caught her fiancée sexually assaulting a bridesmaid; they got married anyway

Two days before his wedding, the groom spent the afternoon floating down the Delaware River in eastern Pennsylvania with his wedding party.  Groomsmen and bridesmaids passed around beers and shots of vodka as they guided paddle boards and rafts downstream.

When they returned to their hotel on August 30, Daniel J. Carney’s wife-to-be asked him to walk inside. The 29-year-old Oregon woman had been too drunk to keep her balance on her paddle board, and as Carney walked her down the hallway, she struggled to stay upright.

Carney pulled the woman into the men’s locker room. Police say he then led the woman to the showers, where he forcibly grabbed her, bit her and removed her bikini bottoms.

On Thursday, Carney, 28, of Stroudsburg, PA, was charged with felony sexual assault. Pennsylvania State Police say it used security footage, text messages, and intercepted a phone call to support the bridemaid’s allegation that she had been sexually assaulted while “blackout” drunk.

The victim told police she woke up briefly on the floor of the locker room to a sharp pain as Carney allegedly bit her and pawed at her body. She said she passed out again, only to wake up minutes later to realize her bikini bottoms had been removed and Carney was on top of her.

Twenty minutes later, police say, his fiancee burst into the men’s showers. The bridesmaid told police her friend immediately started screaming at Carney. The bride followed him into the parking lot and the two got into a physical fight, according to court records.

The next morning, Carney called the bridesmaid to apologize but claimed he didn’t know what they had done the night before, according to the police report. On the morning of the wedding, he texted again to ask the woman to put on a good face for the wedding and to pressure her to take the morning after pill to prevent a pregnancy.

“I wanted to apologize again for everything,” he wrote in a lengthy message, according to the probable cause affidavit. “Can we please just be as happy as possible for [the bride] today? Mistakes are behind us and I just need total closure before I do this [that is] why I’m sending this. I’m as happy as ever to marry [the bride] and I know this is terrible as well but my d--- was out in the shower. We never did do it but would you consider taking plan b to make damn certain just in case? There is almost no chance but still. Please tell me yes I’m begging you."

The next morning, she went and reported the incident to police. Police reviewed surveillance footage. “The footage showed the victim and the accused walking down the hallway, with the victim extremely unsteady on her feet and swaying,” state trooper Justin Leri wrote in a police report. “Just before the doorway, the accused is observed turning around and pulling the victim into the locker room.”

Police then intercepted a call between Carney and the bridesmaid, during which he claimed they did not have “actual sex,” but “repeatedly told her he was sorry, specifically repeating that it was all his fault.” He also admitted to leading the woman into the locker room during the phone call.

Prosecutors charged Carney with simple assault, indecent assault and involuntary deviate sexual intercourse of an unconscious person.