Suspect In ‘Horrific’ San Diego Sex Torture Told Cops, ‘Something Came Over Me’

A San Diego man who attacked two women with a taser, armed with a hatchet and other medieval torture implements in January, told the cops who arrested him that he did it because “something came him,” a prosecutor said

Though he reportedly explained to San Diego police that he was compelled to attack the two women after he went “to a dark place,” Brendan Mathis, 31, pleaded not guilty to what San Diego Deputy District Attorney Mary Ellen Barrett called the “horrific” and “unimaginable” sex torture crimes.

Both victims of Mathis’ alleged sex torture assaults were reported in the media to be paid escorts hired by Mathis after he answered their online advertisements, but Barrett said that she did not know if that was true.

“A victim is a victim, regardless of what they were doing,” the prosecutor told The San Diego Union-Tribune.

Both women survived their terrifying ordeals. The first sex torture victim was left in a hotel room bathroom after Mathis allegedly raped her repeatedly for five hours, then left the room laughing. The second victim, who Mathis met at her apartment, managed to break free from her bonds and escape by leaping from a second-story balcony.

The second attack happened last Wednesday in the San Diego Mid-City area. Mathis was arrested as he walked the street after his victim got away, still carrying a blue bag containing his hatchet and taser. Police said that he was cooperative with the arresting officers.

The first assault took place January 10. According to the police and prosecutor’s accounts, Mathis showed up the San Diego hotel room and as soon as the woman opened the door, he shot her with the taser.

He then tied the woman up by her hands and feet, blindfolded her and told her not to scream and threatened to kill her. He forced her to perform oral sex on him repeatedly and in such violent fashion that the woman suffered injuries. He then raped her repeatedly for several hours, at one point flicking hot cigarette ash on to her genital area.

When he took off the woman’s blindfold, she saw that her attacker had an axe as well as garden shears and a knife.

In his second attempted sex torture attack, Mathis also tasered his 30-year-old victim immediately upon her answering the door. But she resisted him and though he tied her hands behind her back, as he reached into his blue bag — presumably for his hatchet — she was able to slip the restraints and get to a sliding glass door and on to a second-floor balcony.

She leaped off the balcony, landed on an air conditioning unit and ran for help.

San Diego police said that Mathis admitted to the torture attacks, and said that he chose his victims because they were easy targets. he is now held in San Diego County jail on $4 million bail, facing multiple sex assault charges.