Actress Allison Mack has pled guilty to to racketeering and racketeering conspiracy charges over her involvement in NXIVM, a cult-like New York group alleged to have engaged in sexual slavery.
The 36-year-old Smallville actress wept as she pled guilty and apologised to the women prosecutors say were sexually exploited by Keith Raniere, founder of NXIVM.
“I believed Keith Raniere’s intentions were to help people, and I was wrong,” Mack told the judge in a Brooklyn court.
Court papers allege that NXIVM, which marketed itself as a self-help group, was in fact a cult-like secret society comprised of women branded with Raniere’s initials who were forced to have sex with him.
Mack has pled guilty to her role in facilitating this arrangement. She admitted to obtaining compromising information about two women which she threatened to publicise if they did not participate.
Mack had previously pled not guilty to charges of trafficking and conspiracy to commit sex trafficking and forced labour.
Both charges Mack has pled guilty to carry a maximum penalty of twenty years in prison, but she is unlikely to receive such a severe sentence. She is scheduled to be sentenced in September.
The trial of the remaining defendants, including Raniere and several associated people, will begin later this month.
