SCOTTSDALE, AZ — Police say a Scottsdale man has been arrested for holding his girlfriend against her will and allegedly “brutalizing” her in a sex dungeon in his home.
Jason Monroe Smith, 48, was charged with one count of kidnapping.
Public records show Smith was a certified public accountant in Silicon Valley who had his license revoked in 2015 for several professional violations, including dishonesty and fraud.
In an interview with Arizona’s Family, Smith’s girlfriend said she consented to the BDSM activity and said she hoped prosecutors would drop the case.
The woman admits their relationship might sound unorthodox to many, but she says this was not kidnapping or abuse. Rather, she says this was a consensual, agreed upon arrangement, all taking place in his Scottsdale home near Thunderbird Road and 90th Street.
“I love him to death,” the woman said.
Attorney Dwane Cates, who is not involved in the case, said it is not uncommon for victims of domestic violence to recant once a prosecution begins.
“Sometimes these victims believe that they deserve this, and everything’s their fault because they’re told that by the perpetrators,” he said.
The girlfriend, who has asked not to use her name, says she met Smith on a dating website called ‘Secret Benefits.’
The pair communicated for a short time and then began dating.
The victim told police that, at first, their conversations were “normal” dating conversations, but that she was aware Smith was “interested in an alternative lifestyle” which he described as “50 Shades of Grey with a twist,” according to the police report.
It wasn’t long before she moved into his home.
“I’ve never had anybody make me laugh like he does,” she said.
The police report stated that she was aware that Smith had a sex-style “dungeon in his home which encompassed the main living area of his home,” according to the police report.
The report describes the dungeon as an area “with various apparatus meant to torture and control individuals such as a ‘guillotine’/medieval stocks, metal rack, chains, whips, other blunt weapons, hoist with chains, a large cage with a portable plastic toilet.”
Police say Smith drew up a “contract” for the victim, discussing “things she would allow him to do to her in return for living at his home.”
According to the police report, the contract stated “she would refer to herself as ‘the slave’ and he would be ‘master,'” and she would “sleep in a cage.”
According to the police report, the victim told police how, on one occasion, Smith dragged her by the hair through the house, pulled off her clothes, shackled her, handcuffed her, and beat her.
She says one day in March was especially extreme.
The police report says she told detective she was “screaming and crying” and “strained against the restraints hard enough that she claimed her wrist was broken.”
The police report states that the victim claims Smith then restrained her on the floor with “metal U bolts” and “began to whip her with a ‘bull whip.” The victim claims Smith shocked her and whipped her approximately 50 times
Worried there was an emergency, their roommate made an audio recording of what was going on in the house and later took it to police.
The woman downplayed the severity of that episode in an interview with Arizona’s Family.
“People are going to say what they’re going to say and anybody who hears the recording is going to say whatever they’re going to say. And I get it,” she said. “If I was a cop and I heard that I would have kicked the door off the wall. That’s just how it goes. But I’m not bound and gagged and locked in a closet. It’s sad that the picture’s been painted and now, it’s like guilty until proven innocent.”
According to the police report, the victim claims this went on for months, until she left the home on May 6 to meet with the roommate. The roommate and her mother, taking issue with what was going on in the house, flagged down a Scottsdale officer, and handed over the audio.
According to the police report, the girlfriend told police she had escaped, but she would later tell AZFamily that she had simply met the roommate for a meal.
The police report also stated she told officers she had “remained in the house because she had nowhere else to go.”
“It wasn’t fun but I consented to it when I got here. And it wasn’t because it offered me a place to live,” she said.
Smith was arrested on May 8 and was charged with aggravated assault and kidnapping, because police say his girlfriend endured this for several months.
“This is an unusual case for me, I haven’t had this case where we’re dealing with a BDSM component and then kidnapping charges. I can understand how that could come into play and then be misconstrued from the very nature of BDSM,” said Smith’s attorney, Chris Doran.
Smith has been able to post his $250,000 bond, so he is now out of jail, but cannot go home or see his girlfriend as part of his conditions of release.
His girlfriend has even written a letter to the courts, saying she does not want him to be prosecuted. She says she has thrown out all of their bondage equipment.