Monday June 21, 2004
By MAURA KELLY LANNAN
Associated Press Writer

CHICAGO (AP) Republican Senate candidate Jack Ryan pressured his wife, actress Jeri Lynn Ryan, to have sex in clubs while others watched, she charged in divorce documents released Monday.

The “Boston Public” and “Star Trek: Voyager” actress said she angered Ryan by refusing. She did acknowledge infidelity on her part, which she said took place after their marriage was irretrievably broken.

In the documents Ryan denied the allegations, saying he had been “faithful and loyal” to his wife.

Jeri Lynn Ryan charged during a custody hearing that Ryan took her on surprise trips to New Orleans, New York and Paris in 1998, and that he insisted she go to sex clubs with him on each trip.

She said that after going out to dinner with Ryan in New York, he demanded that she go to a club with him.

“It was a bizarre club with cages, whips and other apparatus hanging from the ceiling,” she said. She said Ryan asked her to perform a sexual act while others watched, and she refused.

She said they left and Ryan apologized to her and said it was out of his system. But then, she said, he took her to Paris and again took her to a sex club.

She said she cried and became physically ill at the club, and her husband got angry with her. She said she could never get over that incident.

“I did arrange romantic getaways for us, but that did not include the type of activity she described,” Ryan said in the papers. “We did go to one avant-garde nightclub in Paris which was more than either one of us felt comfortable with. We left and vowed never to return,” he told the court.

He said he felt bad for their son that she would falsely accuse him and said she said she knew he had political aspirations.

In a statement released Monday evening, Jeri Lynn Ryan made no mention of the allegations, but said she now considered Ryan a good man and loving father.

Judge Robert Schnider of Superior Court in Los Angeles ordered Friday the unsealing of portions of the records.

The two had vigorously fought the public disclosure of the files since before Jack Ryan's win in the March 16 Republican primary. They have argued making them public would be harmful to their 9-year-old son, Alex.

The Ryans said they were “disturbed and angered” by the decision but decided not to appeal.

Ryan had repeatedly assured GOP leaders the files contain nothing embarrassing enough to torpedo his bid for the Senate against Democrat Barack Obama.

Rumors about the documents’ contents have been circulating since before the March 16 primary. Some of his GOP opponents raised them as an issue in that campaign, but Ryan won the primary handily.

Schnider said making the records public would prove harmful to the Ryans' son, and could prove embarrassing to the former investment banker and teacher. But he said the public deserved to know the contents.

The Chicago Tribune and Chicago TV station WLS sued to have the documents released.