Golden Nugget St. Charles Drug Sex Attacker Fails to Dent 99-Year Sentence

Posted on: December 17, 2024, 07:23h. 

Last updated on: December 18, 2024, 10:01h.

Philip Conneller Read More
Expertise: Gaming Business, Regulation, Tribal Gaming.

A Louisiana man sentenced to 99 years in prison for drugging, kidnapping, and sexually abusing a woman he met at the Golden Nugget Casino in St. Charles, La., has failed to get his sentence reduced.

Golden Nugget Lake Charles, Stephen Cormier, drink spiking, sex abuse
Stephen Cormier, above, argued that a video found on his phone of him apparently abusing another victim prejudiced the jury against him. The third circuit appellate panel was unmoved. (Image: LCPD)

Stephen Douglas Cormier was convicted in 2023 of second-degree sexual battery, second-degree kidnapping, and mingling harmful substances. Photographs of the abuse were discovered on his phone along with footage of him apparently similarly abusing another woman.

Cormier met his victim, who was drinking and playing blackjack at the Golden Nugget, on Oct. 5, 2021. The two had met once before at the casino two months earlier, according to court documents.

Surveillance video from the Golden Nugget seen by jurors at trial showed Cormier buying two shots at the bar. He was then seen slipping something into one of the glasses and mixing it, before offering the drink to his victim, referred to as “E.M.” in court documents. She proceeded to drink it.

Vile Assault

Shortly after, E.M. became so unsteady she could barely walk. Cormier drove the woman to a friend’s house for whom he was cat-sitting as she was out of town. There he stripped his victim naked from the waist down and took photographs as he sexually assaulted her, according to court documents.

Around this time, the victim’s boyfriend became concerned about her and drove to the Golden Nugget to look for her. He found E.M.’s car in the parking garage but couldn’t locate her at the casino.

Later, the victim’s mother went to the Nugget and found the victim in the car, dazed and lethargic. Security video showed Cormier return to the parking garage and place E.M. in her car.

E.M. said she could remember nothing after meeting Cormier. She undertook a sexual assault examination.

Police found images of the assault on Cormier’s phone, along with video showing the assault of the second victim.

Sick Video

In that video, the second victim is sitting in the passenger seat of Cromier’s car naked from the waist down as he digitally penetrates her. The victim appears to be unconscious. Her eyes are closed. A drinking straw is hanging from her mouth.

In his appeal, Cromier’s lawyers argued this footage shouldn’t have been shown at his trial because it prejudiced the jury, and they were unable to cross-examine the second victim.

There was “no evidence” in the video that the second victim had been kidnapped or drugged, or that the acts it showed were nonconsensual, they claimed.

Police officers testifying on behalf of the second victim said she remembered going on a date with Cormier but had no recollection of being assaulted. She also said she was unaware the video existed.

Louisiana’s Third Circuit Court of Appeal tossed Cormier’s appeal. They said the video showed Cormier was willing to sexually abuse an unconscious woman, which is exactly what he was accused of doing to the first victim.