Colorado police officer texted woman after alleged rape: "Can we at least stay friends?"
A Colorado police officer has been charged with sexually assaulting a woman who said she was incapable of giving consent and then texted her the day after the alleged incident, "God is very upset with me the way I acted," according to an arrest affidavit in the case.
Commerce City Police Officer Michael Glenn Parker was arrested last week in connection with the alleged October 2023 incident at his Fort Lupton home. He has been charged with felony sexual assault on a victim incapable of giving consent. Parker's attorney did not respond to a phone or electronic inquiry from CBS News Colorado. Commerce City has placed Parker on administrative leave without pay.
According to the arrest affidavit, Parker and the unidentified woman first connected on the dating app Hinge. The woman came to Colorado last October to visit a friend and agreed to meet Parker at a bar. The woman's friend told police they had shots at the bar and the friend suggested the officer "could have drugged" her friend at some point.
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When it was time to leave, Parker offered to give them a ride to the friend's home, but instead, he drove the two women to his home in Fort Lupton, 40 minutes away. He later texted, "and that's my fault. I just didn't want the night to end with you, that's all."
At Parker's home, his alleged victim said she "did not remember walking around." "The last memory (she) had was being in Michael's room, laying on his bed with his penis inside," and she "barely remembered it." The next day, she said her genitals hurt and she "might have had sex, but wasn't completely positive."
The woman underwent a rape examination and provided a sample to be tested for drug-facilitated sexual assault, according to the Fort Lupton police arrest affidavit.
The following day, the woman and the officer began texting.
Parker wrote: "I felt like we clicked."
During the text exchange, the woman confronted Parker about what had happened saying she thought they had sex "for a minute but don't really remember."
She asked if he used a condom.
"No we didn't," responded Parker. "I'm praying that god will touch your heart enough to forgive me and let us move pass [sic] this. I am soooo sorry for everything."
The woman responded: "I wasn't coherent enough to remember anything. You just admitted to rape. You literally just admitted that we had sex which is something that I didn't agree to!"
Parker then repeatedly texted saying, "I swear to god! I didn't do that to you!"
"I swear on my daughter's life I am not that person!!," he continued. "I would never ever ever in my life do that to someone !"
He went on to say, "I swear to god I didn't take advantage of you! I didn't do that! I would never jeopardize my career."
Parker was released from the Weld County Jail on a $25,000 bond. He is due in court in April.
The same month police arrested Parker, several women testified before a committee at the State Legislature, pressing for passage of a bill that would place state regulations on dating apps.
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"I was not the first one he had done this to and this dating app was his hunting ground," testified Anne Marie Kopek, who said she was raped 12 years ago in Florida by a man she met on a dating app. "My story is not unique."
Another woman, Vanessa Newport, testified that in 2003 she too was sexually assaulted by a man she met on a dating app. She said he was a police officer who ransacked her home and intimidated her with multiple handguns.
Legislators are scheduled to vote on March 11 on whether to advance SB 24-011 out of committee.
