Lawyer: Woman faked attack

A Newport Beach woman pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges she tried to extort $15,000 from a man she allegedly falsely told police had raped her.

Susanna Coetzee, 28, is charged with extortion and filing a false police report and faces up to three years in prison for what prosecutors called a hastily put together plan to cash in on a 37-year-old man’s wealth.

“It wasn’t particularly clever; it wasn’t particularly well thought out,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Andy Manssourian. “It seems like it was done a little bit on the fly. I didn’t get the sense she has done this before.”

On April 1, police said Coetzee met her victim, a married man, for drinks and eventually the two went to an Anaheim hotel room.

The two had met through the website “Sugar Daddies, Mommies, and Babies,” at www.seekingarrangement.com.

The website connects wealthy, older men and women with their younger halves, who look for money in exchange for the relationship.

Coetzee’s profile was removed or suspended from the site.

Manssourian said after the two went up to the hotel room, Coetzee demanded money. The man told her he wasn’t going to pay for sex and refused, prosecutors said.

She then proceeded to seduce him, and when they began having sex, she abruptly stopped and demanded money a second time, authorities said. When he refused, Manssourian said she began complaining of wrist and stomach pain and cut her own finger, then told the man he had broken her hand and made her bleed everywhere.

Authorities said she ran out of the room, past hotel guests screaming she was raped.

“It totally looked like she was completely faking it,” Manssourian said a witness told police.

Hotel security called the police and talked to Coetzee, who had returned to the room. Prosecutors said 12 hours after the incident, the man started receiving text messages from Coetzee asking him how he would want the whole incident to go away.

The authorities had the man agree to meet Coetzee at the Block in Orange on Tuesday for a money exchange, Manssourian said. Coetzee brought a letter with her absolving the man of any crimes, stating that they both had “too much to drink” and she withdrew all her statements and was in fact not raped, he said. Police arrested her after the man handed her the money.

Coetzee is scheduled to be back in court April 27.

Reporter JOSEPH SERNA may be reached at (714) 966-4619 or at [email protected].