Anand Jon sentenced to 59 years: Sister threatens hunger-strike India News and Travel Times Provides India-centric and other News and Features

Sanjana Jon, sister of celebrity fashion designer Anand Jon has appealed to the Government of India to intervene in the case of her brother, failing which she would go on hunger-strike. On Monday, Los Angeles Superior Court sentenced Anand Jon to 59 years in prison for sexually assaulting aspiring models as young as 14 years in age. Sanajana said that she would observe a hunger strike, if her pleas for help at the inter-governmental level were not paid heed to. "My appeal is for intervention and I have said if I don't get any help, my only resort, last resort would be to sit on a hunger strike till my voice is heard," said Sanjana Jon. In Bangalore, Anand Jon's fashion designer friend and stage artiste, Prasad Bidappa expressed sorrow at the American court's judgement. "Anand Jon case, I find particularly sad because I feel he was truly a very good talent; somebody who, I think, was taking India's torch forward in terms of fashion. I feel very sad that it had to come to an end like this," said Prasad Bidappa.

Last November, thirty five-year-old Jon was found guilty of 16 counts, including rape, sexual battery and performing lewd acts on a child. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge David Wesley sentenced Jon to 59 years to life after denying his motions for a new trial. Prosecutors said the crimes started in 2001 when Jon set up a fashion design business through which he lured would-be models to Los Angeles. Later, the police got involved in March 2007 after a woman said she was sexually assaulted at his Beverly Hills apartment. Jon, whose full name is Anand Jon Alexander, denied the charges. His lawyers said the girls and young women were revenge seekers who had made up their stories or who had 'invited what happened', and that in the case, there had been least physical evidence. The India-born designer was profiled on the TV show 'America's Next Top Model' in 2003 and selected by Newsweek magazine as one of the world's most successful South Asians in 2004.

The designer's mother Shashi Jon said, "He is not capable of doing anything like this.This was beyond my belief that Anand has been taken in and arrested on charges of molestation". Their family's lawyer Majid Memon said, "It is very sad that this young boy, a celebrity from India, has to be left like this and being now convicted and sentenced to suffer for the whole of his life." Times Now quoted Memon as saying that all the girls alleging rape or molestation don't have a "scratch on their body to suggest that there was any resistance or any violence by the accused. Moreover, the complaints have been lodged weeks and even months after the incidents. So definitely this is a very dubious kind of a charge and unfortunately Anand was left alone and there was hardly any help. Jon's mother and sister will now move for an appeal," Memon said. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge David Wesley today announced that Jon must serve 14 years in state prison -- before he begins to serve a 45-year-to-life sentence. The designer has been featured on the television show "America's Next Top Model" and worked with such celebrities as Paris Hilton and Mary J Blige.

London: India-born Anand Jon Alexander has been jailed for a minimum of 59 years for sexually assaulting aspiring models. The 35-year old lured models to his flat with promises of work. He was found guilty to 16 sex crimes at a trial in November. His victims, some of whom gave evidence in court, ranged in age from 14 to 21, reports Sky News. Alexander preyed on a string of girls and women over a six-year period from 2002 to 2007, prosecutors said. Prosecutors said Alexander often found women online, baited them with promises of glamorous photoshoots and other modelling work, only to assault or rape them at his Beverly Hills apartment. The designer was featured on the US television show America's Next Top Model.