Max van den Berg

Ron Jeremy bragged on camera that he had slept with 3,600 women. Years later prosecutors charged him with sexually assaulting 21 of them, including a 15-year-old girl. Before any of that he was a special education teacher in New York. Master's degree. Nice Jewish boy from Queens. Then his girlfriend sent his photo to a magazine. Within a few years he was the most recognizable man in adult films. More than 2,000 movies. A Guinness World Record. Cameos in Hollywood films, rap videos, reality TV. People stopped him on the street for selfies. They called him the Hedgehog and laughed. In the video below, an interviewer asks him about the money. He laughs it off. He says porn stars aren't millionaires. He says people think they are, but the scene pay is nothing special. He made his real money from his name. Appearances. Signings. Being Ron Jeremy. He tells the story about 3,600 women like it's a fun fact. For decades, women had been telling a different story. That he grabbed them at conventions, at parties, in clubs. That everyone in the industry knew. That nobody did anything because he was the funny guy. In 2017 the industry banned him from its own events. In 2020 Los Angeles prosecutors charged him. The final count: 34 counts involving 21 women. Rape. Sexual assault. Incidents going back to the early 1990s. He never went to trial. In 2023 a judge ruled he had severe dementia and wasn't mentally competent to stand trial. He was sent to a state hospital. He was never convicted. The women never got their day in court. Was Ron Jeremy a harmless joke the whole world was in on, or a predator who hid in plain sight because everyone was too busy laughing?