Celebrity fashion designers are always jetting coast to coast — just not in handcuffs.
Anand Jon Alexander — whose Indian-inspired frocks have been worn by Paris Hilton, Oprah and Janet Jackson — was hauled into a Manhattan court from a California prison today to face accusations of casting couch assaults against 12 young women and girls.
He’s already serving 59 years to life in prison in California for sex assaults on seven other victims. More cases await in Dallas, authorities there have said.
His New York victims ranged in age from 15 to 26, law enforcement officials said, and came from across the country. Jonwould lure them to New York after seeing their pictures online. He would tell them “You’re gorgeous,” and that he wanted them to model in his fashion line.
Alexander, 36, pleaded “Not guilty” in a slight accent from his native India. He wore a prison-issued beige pair of cargo pants and a white t-shirt. He’s kept his designer eyeglasses, but his fancy mane of black hair has been cut off, except for the long fringe of bangs he kept brushing aside with a flick of his head as he stood before a judge.
Alexander will be held here pending a possible trial on the Manhattan charges, which include forcible sodomy and rape, carrying maximum sentences of 25 years to life in prison. California authorities have said that any sentences he earns elsewhere must be served after he completes his West Coast time.
His alleged attacks here took place between 2002 and 2006, and targeted young model wannabes. His youngest California victim was only 14.
Before his 2007 arrest, Alexander was named a person to watch by Newsweek magazine as an up-and-coming fashion star. He’d appeared as a guest designer on the reality show, “America’s Next Top Model.”