Surprising never-before-seen paperwork from an ongoing trial regarding allegedly stolen Eagles lyrics shine new gentle on an notorious evening in 1980 when Don Henley was arrested after a teen overdosed at his residence.
Henley has all the time maintained that the overdose occurred throughout a going-away social gathering full of crew members because the band started a prolonged post-’70s hiatus. Henley was charged with giving cocaine to a minor, however stated he took the rap to guard the others. He additionally has maintained that he by no means had intercourse with the teenager.
“There have been roadies and guys in my home – we have been having a farewell to the Eagles,” Henley informed GQ in 1991. “I acquired all of them out of the home; I took full blame for every part. I used to be silly; I may have flushed everything down the bathroom. I did not need this woman dying in my home. I wished to get her medical attention. I did what I assumed was greatest, and I paid the worth.”
A recent letter written by Henley to a Santa Monica probation officer, now launched into proof within the unrelated present trial, tells a really completely different story.
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Reasonably than going down at a celebration, Henley writes that he was depressed and alone when he referred to as an escort service. Quickly, a younger girl appeared on the door, and so they shared some cocaine whereas attending to know each other higher. “She informed me that she was solely a brief call-girl till she paid off a $2,000 cocaine debt in San Diego,” Henley writes within the assertion. He says she later admitted to doing extra coke “each time I acquired as much as get her a drink or went to the bathroom.”
Within the letter, Henley says he tried to have intercourse with the teenager earlier than she talked about that she did not really feel effectively. He was within the lavatory getting her aspirin, in keeping with the assertion, when she started to have a seizure.
Henley referred to as for assist, however the teen appeared to have recovered by the point paramedics arrived. He says they left after Henley promised to get her residence safely. He says he then referred to as a good friend to offer her a experience, and the good friend had simply arrived when members of the Los Angeles Police Division’s Sexually Exploited Baby Unit arrived on the morning of Nov. 24, 1980.
Information stories stated investigators confiscated 22 grams of cocaine and 5 ounces of marijuana, in addition to Quaaludes and different medication. The 16-year-old escort, apparently nonetheless bare, was charged with prostitution whereas her 15-year-old good friend was arrested for being beneath the affect of medication.
Then in his early 30s, Henley later pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor cost of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. He was finally sentenced to 2 years probation and a $2,500 positive.
‘It is No Large Deal’
On this bygone period, there gave the impression to be little fear over how this may influence Henley’s profession. “It is no large deal,” a record-label government informed the Los Angeles Occasions. “Children do not precisely put rock stars on a pedestal as of late.” That is the way it performed out.
Henley’s description of himself as a sympathetic fall man on this ugly incident turned an understood a part of Eagles historical past. He additionally leveraged private outrage over associated media protection into his first solo radio hit. The entire thing mainly slipped into the previous.
Then a brand new trial acquired underway this week within the case of allegedly stolen lyrics sheets from the Resort California period. Attorneys for Edward Kosinski, one of many accused, sought to introduce Henley’s letter into the report and interrogate him about his public descriptions of the evening in query.
Manhattan Assistant District Lawyer Aaron Ginandes fought to have it excluded. “Mr. Henley has a 1980 misdemeanor conviction and given the size of time, how way back that was, and the truth that that misdemeanor conviction has – the character of it’s fairly prejudicial and it has completely no probative worth,” Ginandes argued.
Decide Curtis Farber disagreed, and the letter shall be a part of the defendant attorneys’ makes an attempt to question Henley’s honesty. Henley will apparently testify between Eagles tour stops.
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