Drunken Sobek Seduced Him, Rathbun Testifies

A freelance photographer accused of raping and killing model Linda Sobek said Friday that the former cheerleader drank half a flask of tequila and seduced him during a November photo shoot.

Charles Rathbun, 39, is accused of sexually torturing and strangling Sobek. Defense attorneys claim that Sobek was accidentally asphyxiated after engaging in consensual sex with Rathbun.

Describing for the first time the details of the Nov. 16 photo assignment for an auto magazine, Rathbun said Sobek took a nip of tequila on a $20 bet and the situation soon got more “personal.”

Sobek, 27, took several more drinks from a flask, eventually consuming half of it, Rathbun testified.

Before defense attorney Mark Werksman finished his morning questioning, Rathbun had told how Sobek exposed herself while wearing a see-through dress.

“She laughed and said, ‘All photographers are the same,’ ” Rathbun testified. “She said, ‘All you want to do is see this. . . .’ She spread her knees apart real quick so I could get a look.”

“Basically, I took that for an invitation,” and immediately started kissing her thighs, Rathbun said.

There was no apparent reaction from Sobek’s family, who have attended the trial daily. But on the way into court Friday, Sobek’s mother called Rathbun’s story preposterous.

“There’s no way, like I said before, that she would have consented to having consensual sex or any other kind of sex with him,” Elaine Sobek told reporters.

Werksman waved aside Sobek’s comments.

“It’s up to the jury to decide, not the Sobek family,” he said.

On Thursday, Rathbun told jurors that he knew Sobek only casually, having photographed her in 1993 for the cover of another magazine. He said the two had gotten along fine on the earlier assignment.

Rathbun said he hired Sobek for the Nov. 16 assignment at the last minute to replace his girlfriend. Sobek was to pose with a Lexus sport utility vehicle for AutoWeek magazine.

Rathbun initially told police that he accidentally struck and killed Sobek while demonstrating stunts with the Lexus, and that he then panicked and buried her body in a shallow grave in Angeles National Forest.