Mississippi financial planner receives 30-year-sentence without possibility of parole for rape of woman in his New Orleans apartment

Published 4:39 pm Thursday, April 14, 2022

A Mississippi financial planner who was convicted of rape was sentenced to 30 years in prison without the possibility of probation or parole.

NOLA.com reports that William McDonough, 49, of Natchez, Miss., was sentenced Thursday after being convicted in March of raping one of three women who have accused him of the sex crime.

In McDonough’s first trial — a trial that lasted four days — prosecutors say McDonough refused to listen to the victim when she pleaded “no” multiple times as he raped her in his New Orleans Warehouse District apartment on Sept. 15, 2016.

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McDonough’s attorney Cameron Mary repeatedly requested a retrial, stating that his client did not receive a fair trial for numerous reasons, including the admittance of hearsay evidence and improper remarks by District Attorney Jason Williams during the trial. District Court Judge Tracey Flemings-Davillier denied the requests.

Prior to his arrest and a more than two-year wait for trial as courts were delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, McDonough worked as a financial planner in Vidalia, Louisiana, just across the river from his home in Natchez, Mississippi.

McDonough still faces two additional second-degree rape charges as well from incidents with two different women, both of whom served as witnesses in the trial this week.