The room was something he regularly boasted about, and Manson himself said, “If anyone’s bad, I can lock them in it, and it’s soundproof.”
Trigger Warning: This story discusses sexual assault which may be disturbing to readers.
Marilyn Manson, who has previously been accused of sexual abuse, reportedly had a small, soundproof glass enclosure in his apartment at West Hollywood, California. Dubbed the "Bad Girls' Room," he used to lock up women he was dating, numerous sources alleged in a report published in Rolling Stone.
Several people who dated Manson—whose real name is Brian Warner—said the space was a "solitary-confinement cell used to psychologically torture women."
"He always had a joking, bragging tone," Ashley Walters, Warner's former assistant who is suing him for sexual assault said, adding that he liked to boast to others about the room. Another former assistant, Ryan Brown, who worked with Warner for eight years, said that he'd never seen any women confined in the so-called Bad Girls’ Room during his tenure, but says, “It was common knowledge that’s what everybody had called it.”
Manson himself had mentioned it to a magazine in 2012, saying: “If anyone’s bad, I can lock them in it, and it’s soundproof.”
Ashley Morgan Smithline, one of the numerous women who have accused Warner of abuse, said that she was forced into the room several times, even though it was only the size of a department-store dressing room, for hours together.
“At first, he made it sound cool,” Smithline says. “Then, he made it sound very punitive. Even if I was screaming, no one would hear me.” As she tells it, “First you fight, and he enjoys the struggle. I learned to not fight it, because that was giving him what he wanted. I just went somewhere else in my head.”
Several women have come forward to publicly accuse Manson of sexual, physical, and psychological abuse. Evan Rachel Wood said Warner "horrifically" abused her while they dated from 2007 to 2010. Game of Thrones actor Esmé Bianco is suing Warner, claiming he physically and sexually assaulted her.
However, according to Insider, Manson has previously denied the allegations against him. He even shared a post on Instagram, claiming that "these recent claims about me are horrible distortions of reality."
"My intimate relationships have always been entirely consensual with like-minded partners," he added.
The shocking, tell-all report was compiled after conducting 55 interviews with people who have known Warner. Accusers said the rocker "was able to hide his abuses in plain sight behind the Marilyn Manson character he created and the music industry that supported and profited from, his living-demon shtick," the outlet wrote.
References:
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/marilyn-manson-abuse-allegations-1256888/
https://www.instagram.com/p/CKxZavzAGOe/
https://www.insider.com/marilyn-manson-locked-women-soundproof-bad-girls-room-report-2021-11
Cover Image Source: Getty Images | Photo by Jason Merritt