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Today, the Alexander brothers’ sex trafficking trial entered its next phase with a few surprise developments.
Prosecutors rested their case against Oren, Alon and Tal Alexander midway through the day, handing it off to the defense. We learned that as part of the defense’s case, Alon may take the stand, and that the trial will likely wrap up sooner than expected.
Marc Agnifilo, an attorney for Oren, indicated on Monday morning that one or two of the defendants were considering testifying. By the end of the day, Alon’s attorney Howard Srebnick said Alon was the only one of the brothers who could take the stand. The defense also said they could rest on Tuesday, pending his testimony.
Roughly 50 percent of defendants testify at their own criminal trials. Judge Valerie Caproni said defendants have a right to testify, though they often don’t.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Elizabeth Espinoza said that if Alon does take the stand, she plans to cross-examine him on sexual assault allegations against him and his brothers when they were teenagers. After the Alexanders were arrested in December 2024, prosecutors said the brothers began establishing a playbook for their attacks as early as high school, though the charges against them don’t include any conduct from that time period.
The government’s conclusion followed five weeks of testimony from roughly a dozen women who allege they were raped and/or drugged by one or more of the brothers.
Attorneys for the brothers began presenting their case Monday afternoon by calling two private chefs who previously worked with the brothers in the Hamptons.
Once the defense finishes presenting evidence in its case, both the prosecutors and defense attorneys will sum up their arguments before the judge sends the jury to deliberate.
Here’s what else happened on Monday:
• Nicholas Ciccolo, an investigative analyst with the U.S. Attorney’s Office, concluded his testimony, which centered on reading communications between the brothers and other men. The messages included conversations about blogs and how they talked about securing women for trips, such as Fyre Festival in 2017.
• During that trip to the Bahamas, a woman named Amber Davis messaged Oren that she was upset about what had happened that morning in May 2017. “You have to ask someone before you have sex with them. I woke up to a dick inside me,” she wrote.
• In a group chat that included Tal, Oren, Alon, Erik Yehezkel, Matt Sinnreich, Joseph Hanono, Babba Joshua Yesharim, Romi Mawardi, Julian Cohen and Matt Werner, Alon writes that he’s “in if we got at least 3 to 1 [ratio] with Cuban Hoes to Horny Israelis.”
• Zach Intrater, one of Tal’s attorneys, questioned Ciccolo about his involvement and knowledge of the case, which is limited to the messages he read aloud.
— Katherine Kallergis and Sheridan Wall
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