JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – (Disclaimer: Some may find details provided in this story to be graphic in nature. Discretion advised.)
A man who police once described as a prominent tattoo artist in Jacksonville pleaded guilty Friday to five counts of sexual battery, according to court documents.
Court records show James Ranieri was arrested in August 2021 on three counts of sexual battery. Records show two additional charges were filed after other women came forward.
Ranieri was sentenced to 10 years in prison followed by 15 years of probation and a lifetime inclusion on the Florida Department of Law Enforcement’s registered sex offender list.
The five women who made allegations gave their approval to the plea agreement, and were all either in court Friday or watched remotely. The assaults were reported between 2015 and 2018.
News4JAX on Friday spoke with two of the five women who came forward to police after learning of the prison sentence. They described his personality.
“He would seem really nice at first, and really calm, then completely shift,” the first woman said.
“He had a completely different personality, and then when I said, ‘No,’ and wanted to leave, he turned into a completely different person,” the second woman said.
The first woman said she met Ranieri online and thought he was harmless because he was so well-known.
“When somebody’s well-known and it seems like they’re likable, it makes them a little bit easier to be comfortable around,” the first woman said.
The second woman we spoke with is a tattoo artist who said she knew Ranieri through a circle of other tattoo artists. She said he reached out to her via social media to express interest in going out with her. She said she also thought he was harmless given his popularity and celebrity-like status in the tattoo community. But her view of him changed when, she said, he locked her in a dark room of his apartment.
“There was no real way for me to get out of the situation, so it was a wrestling match until he finally won. I had to give up at some point,” the second woman said.
She said she was told by other tattoo artists to stay silent about what happened because Ranieri was so popular, no one would believe her and that it would damage her career. But she eventually reported the attack after learning other women had reported being sexually assaulted by Ranieri.
Both women we spoke with said what they went through has forever impacted their lives.
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March 19, 2022 at 06:28AM
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Tattoo artist pleads guilty to 5 counts of sexual battery, sentenced to prison - WJXT News4JAX
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