Former "That '70s Show" star Danny Masterson has had his 2023 rape convictions upheld by a California appeals court.
A three-judge panel affirmed Masterson's convictions on two counts of forcible rape in an 89-page opinion filed Oct. 27. The actor, who pleaded not guilty to the charges in 2020, has repeatedly maintained that the encounters were consensual.
The 50-year-old, who is serving 30 years to life in prison, was convicted in May 2023 of raping two women in separate incidents in 2003, at the height of his fame from the Fox sitcom. His lawyers filed a notice of appeal in November 2023, months after jurors found him guilty on two counts but deadlocked on a third.
Masterson's attorneys, Cliff Gardner and Eric Multhaup, shared a statement on Oct.
27 that said the California Second District Court of Appeal's decisions were "fundamentally wrong." They vowed to take the case to the California Supreme Court "while separately continuing to pursue habeas corpus relief."
The attorneys allege there is "substantial" evidence that was never presented to jury members during his 2022 trial and 2023 retrial. According to the lawyers, the women Masterson is convicted of raping shared statements in the past that cast their sexual experiences with the actor in a favorable light.
"Danny is serving a life sentence for crimes he did not commit," Gardner said. "No one in California – not defendants and not victims who have actually been the victim of a sex crime – is safer by virtue of today's unfortunate decision."
Among the arguments Masterson's team made in their appeal was a claim that the judge overseeing his case "displayed non-neutrality, even hostility, toward his religion." Masterson and his victims were all members of the Church of Scientology.
"Those statements, viewed in context, evidence no animus or departure from neutrality regarding Scientology," the three-judge panel wrote in their opinion.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Danny Masterson's rape conviction appeal is denied after 3 years
