Dr. Orlando Llorente, the plastic surgeon accused of holding his girlfriend captive and waterboarding her in a Brickell apartment over a Facebook posting, just keeps getting stranger. For one thing, the victim wasn't really a girlfriend but an ex-mistress. Yes, Llorente is married, and his wife is standing by his side.
Llorente also claims that the victim is unstable and trumped up the charges.
Llorente remains in jail with no bond, but according to CBS Miami his attorney Marcos Beaton filed a motion with the court yesterday seeking bail. Beaton argued that Llorente was at one time separated from his wife but had decided to get back together with her. According to Llorente's version of events, the mistress he had met during the separation became angry at the news and tried to persuade him to leave his wife. She had threatened "to go public with their relationship ... falsify allegations ... and ruin Dr. Llorente's career" if he didn't do so.
The victim had claimed that Llorente became enraged over something she has posted on Facebook and held her captive for up to 16 hours, during which he held her head in the toilet, banged her face against the floor, essentially waterboarded her, and threatened to kill her.
However, Llorente's defense team claims that there is no actual physical evidence to back up the claims. The defense also presented a police report from earlier this year in which the victim had been arrested for attacking and biting her brother and had been ordered to undergo a mental evaluation.
Meanwhile, during the court proceedings Llorente's wife sat in the audience surrounded by nearly two dozen of Llorente's friends, colleagues and relatives.
The judge set a May 24 court date at which time Llorente's lawyers will be able to present more evidence to convince the judge to grant Llorente a reasonable bail.
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