A hip-hop artist and social media influencer who has amassed a six-figure follower base on social media has been charged with rape and intent to commit rape, prosecutors said Tuesday.
The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office said Clinton Adams, 32, who it said goes by “Clintnlord” online, took two women to a desolate area created by Los Angeles’ disastrous Palisades Fire in January and sexually assaulted them. He is charged with three felony counts of forcible rape and a felony count of assault with the intent to commit rape.
The violence took place on separate occasions in the summer, the DA’s office said.
“These women showed courage by coming forward to report their assaults,” District Attorney Nathan Hochman said in a statement Tuesday.
Prosecutors and Los Angeles police detectives working the case believe there may be more victims and have asked any, along with possible witnesses, to reach out.
Adams, a resident of Los Angeles’ Northridge community, has pleaded not guilty to all counts and was being held in lieu of nearly $1.5 million bail, according to the DA’s office.
A lawyer listed in court documents as his primary counsel did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Charges include separate counts of rape in connection with attacks alleged to have taken place on June 29, Aug. 7 and Aug. 8, according to court documents. For each, there is a special allegation of aggravated circumstances, namely that multiple victims were involved, according to the DA’s office.
In addition, he was charged with one count of intent to commit rape in connection with an incident alleged to have happened Aug. 7, according to court documents.
The special allegations could add time to a sentence if prosecutors are successful. The DA’s office said the case could result in a 90-year sentence.
In its statement, the DA’s office described the location of the alleged crimes as “a vacant area impacted by January wildfires” and said Adams “lured” victims there.
Citing a police detective, the news wire City News Service previously reported that the alleged attacks took place at a vacant residence.
Hochman called the alleged crimes “predatory.”
“Taking advantage of a historic disaster and causing severe harm to two women is despicable,” he said in Tuesday’s statement.
The Palisades Fire was one of two deadly wildfires — multiple others were nonfatal — that broke out amid a windstorm on Jan. 7, leveling historic neighborhoods in Pacific Palisades, a beachside community in the city of Los Angeles, and Altadena, a foothill city about 15 miles northeast of downtown Los Angeles.
At least 31 people were killed in the fires in Los Angeles County. Less than a year later, rebuilding is still underway.
Though a social media account for Adams states that his last music release was roughly three years ago, he has amassed a sizable fan base on Instagram, where his account showed 376,000 followers, and on TikTok, where his page displayed nearly 155,000.
A preliminary hearing was scheduled for Jan. 21 in downtown Los Angeles criminal court.
