Anna Stubblefield maintains it was love.
The then-Rutgers University professor said she had a breakthrough nearly 15 years ago with a nonverbal disabled adult student and they connected through “facilitated communication” using a keyboard.
They eventually developed romantic feelings and had sex, Stubblefield said.
The man’s family, however, said it was rape because he could not consent. Prosecutors agreed and spent years trying to put the professor behind bars.
Now, six years after Stubblefield last appeared in a criminal court, the story is being told in a documentary called “Tell Them You Love Me,” on Sky Documentaries. The film features Stubblefield, the victim’s mother and brother, and experts, a synopsis says.
“Through exclusive footage and interviews with those on both sides of the case, this feature documentary weaves a riveting and endlessly nuanced story about communication, race, and sex,” the synopsis says.
The film uses the man’s name. But, NJ Advance Media and other news organizations referred to him during the trial as D.J. because he was a sexual assault victim.
Stubblefield met D.J. in 2008, when she was teaching at Rutgers-Newark and he was a student. She was chair of the philosophy department.
They began meeting in 2009, first with his parents, then alone in her office. He was in his late 20s, she was in her late 30s. Stubblefield thought he was misdiagnosed, and she could help him communicate – through facilitated communication, using a computer.
In May 2011, Stubblefield told D.J.’s family they had sex and were in love, and kissed him in front of his parents. They told her to leave him alone and reported her to Rutgers officials, who reported her to law enforcement.
The Essex County Prosecutor’s Office eventually charged Stubblefield, then of West Orange, and she went on trial in 2015. A jury convicted Stubblefield of first-degree aggravated sexual assault and a judge sentenced her to 12 years in prison.
“I don’t think Anna understood the depth of pain she caused my family,” D.J.’s brother said at her first sentencing in 2016, alleging the professor raped his brother.
The case was later overturned on appeal, and in 2018 Stubblefield and the prosecutor’s office reached a deal. She would plead guilty to third-degree charge of aggravated criminal sexual contact and the judge would sentence her to the time she’d already served behind bars.
The deal called for Stubblefield to admit she knew at the time of her sexual contact with D.J. that he’d been found mentally incompetent and could not legally consent. She also agreed to parole supervision for life and had to register as a sex offender under Megan’s Law.
In the documentary film’s teaser, Stubblefield says: “I’m not guilty of the crime.”
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Kevin Shea may be reached at kshea@njadvancemedia.com
