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Beltran to Bodström: 'Have you been taking cocaine'

TT/The Local
TT/The Local - [email protected]
Beltran to Bodström: 'Have you been taking cocaine'

Opera star Tito Beltran launched a verbal attack on defence lawyer Thomas Bodström when the singer's high-profile rape trial resumed on Monday morning at Ystad District Court.

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Beltran, 42, denies raping an 18-year-old nanny at his hotel room in Nötesjö after returning from a performance at a star-studded Rhapsody in Rock concert in southern Sweden in 1999.

A heated exchange developed after former Justice Minister Bodström asked Beltran if he had told his wife he had been unfaithful.

"Yes. My ex-wife wanted to sully my name but I had already told my new wife about everything that had happened," said the singer.

Bodström was quick to pounce on what he interpreted as an admission of guilt.

"But you claim not to have had sex with the nanny," he said.

Enraged by the lawyer's line of reasoning, the opera singer wondered aloud whether Bodström was perhaps under the influence of narcotics.

"You're just trying to twist my words to get me locked up. Have you been taking cocaine or what's your problem?" said Beltran.

At this point, the chairman of the court and Beltran's lawyer both intervened to calm the irate singer.

Actress Maria Lundqvist was called to testify shortly afterwards. Lundqvist employed the young nanny to look after her children for the duration of the 1999 Rhapsody in Rock tour.

"I liked her a lot. She displayed an incredible warmth towards my children," she told the court.

A friendship developed between the women, who slept in the same room while on tour. But Lundqvist noted that they had only been in contact sporadically since the alleged incident in the Nötesjö hotel room.

"I think what happened marked her deeply," said the actress.

According to Lundqvist, the nanny was distraught after her visit to Beltran's bedroom.

The nanny went to the singer's room after he offered to massage her aching back. She claims that Beltran then forced her onto his bed.

"'Maria, he raped me,' she said," according to Lundqvist.

The actress told the court that the nanny's underwear smelled of sperm. She rushed to Beltran's room to give him a piece of her mind but the singer claimed not to have touched the nanny.

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