Jackie Fuchs is accusing Kim Fowley of rape during the time Fowley worked as the founder and manager of the all-female rock band The Runaways in the '70s.
Fuchs, who’s stage name was Jackie Fox, claims she was drugged and raped when she was 16 years old while she was the
bassist for the band, according to a new piece on The Huffington Post's Highline.
The assault allegedly took place at a party after The Runaways’ New Year’s Eve concert in Orange County, California, in 1975 after a man she thought to be a roadie
told her to take Quaaludes, according to the New York Daily News.
Sources confirmed the account, and one added, it was a “date-rape type situation.”
Fuchs, now 55, told HuffPost she slipped in and out of consciousness as Fowley raped her.
He was “gnashing his teeth and growling like a dog,” she said. “I remember opening my eyes, Kim Fowley was raping me, and there were people watching me.”
The people staring at her is the final scene she can recall from that night, but Fuchs insists bandmates Joan Jett and Cherie Currie were present.
Jett previously denied witnessing the incident and persisted in her story
after the article was released, according to The Guardian.
“Anyone who truly knows me understands that if I was aware of a friend or bandmate being violated, I would not stand by while it happened,” Jett said. “Obviously Jackie’s story is extremely upsetting and although we haven’t spoken in decades, I wish her peace and healing.”
The Guardian also reported that Currie posted a statement to Facebook in response to the accusation that she “did nothing."
“I have been accused of a crime," she wrote. "Of looking into the dead yet pleading eyes of a girl, unable to move while she was brutally raped and doing nothing . . . I am innocent.”
Currie added she would take a polygraph test to prove her innocence when she returns to the United States after traveling to Sweden.
Following the release of the statements, Fuchs wrote her own post on Facebook reacting to the
messages from her former bandmates, Vulture reported.
“I know some people watching the online drama unfold have been discouraged by the lack of support I’ve received from my former bandmate. To which I can only say that I hope you never have to walk in their shoes,” Fuchs posted. “My rape was traumatic for everyone, not just me, and everyone deals with trauma in their own way and time.”
The bassist did not leave the band until two years later, though she cites the incident as a reason for her departure.
Fuchs said she is coming forward with her story after similar reports have been revealed about Bill Cosby and music producer Dr. Luke.
Two others alleged they, too, were assaulted by Fowley as teenagers, according to the Huffington Post article.
Fowley died in January from bladder cancer and had denied improper sexual contact with The Runaways in the past, according to the Daily News.