US bride finds groom 'sexually assaulting' bridesmaid 2 days before wedding, decides to marry him anyway

This bride-to-be clearly took "Till death do us part" seriously as she married her fiance even after she found him sexually assaulting one of her bridesmaids.

American TV station WNEP reported that 28-year-old Daniel Carney was charged last week with sexual assault for "allegedly forcing himself on his wife's bridesmaid".

Despite the bride walking in on the assault, the couple still got hitched on Sept 1.

According to court papers, the assault occurred at the Shawnee Inn in Pennsylvania on Aug 30 where the wedding party and friends had gathered to celebrate Carney's upcoming nuptials.

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In an article by The Morning Call, it was revealed that the group had been imbibing alcohol while rafting on the Delaware River when the victim, a 29-year-old woman, became too heavily intoxicated to maintain her balance. When the group returned to the inn, she was unable to stand on her own and the bride-to-be asked Carney to walk her in.

He walked her down the hallway before suddenly pulling her into the men's locker room. The woman admitted to the police that she had difficulty recalling what happened but remembered "waking up in the locker room with Carney biting her and forcefully grabbing her".

She blacked out a second time and woke up to the man "on top of her and her bikini bottoms pulled off".

It was at this point that the bride-to-be walked in and started screaming at Carney, said the victim.

Police reports stated that Carney called the victim the following morning to apologise but claimed he didn’t know what they had done the night before. He also texted the victim on the morning of his wedding and asked her to put on a good face for the bride and begged her to take the morning-after pill.

Carney also allegedly told people that the victim had "followed him" into the locker room and he initially told the authorities that he was "extremely drunk" and felt that she had "taken advantage" of him.

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However, further investigations by the police yielded security footage which disproved Carney's account of what happened.

State trooper Justin Leri wrote in a police report: “The footage showed the victim and the accused walking down the hallway, with the victim extremely unsteady on her feet and swaying. Just before the doorway, the accused is observed turning around and pulling the victim into the locker room.”

After the video surfaced, Carney changed his story and admitted to pulling the victim into the locker room.

The police also listened in on a second call between Carney and the victim where he claimed they did not have "actual sex" but admitted to leading her into the locker room and "sexually assaulting" her. He also "repeatedly apologised" and said the fault was his.

According to WNEP, Carney was arraigned on Monday (Oct 7) morning and is due back in court next month.

bryanlim@asiaone.com