Frontman of emo rock band Aiden accused of leading sex cult and abusing women

Multiple women are coming forward with abuse allegations against William ‘Control’ Francis, the frontman of emo band Aiden.

The women claim that the band’s frontman, 36, emotionally abused them, forcing them to get his initials tattooed on them and even demanded that his partners sign contracts deeming them as ‘slaves’.

‘My body is His to use in any way He should choose, and I will never object to any actions He chooses to perform, or have myself perform on Him,’ an excerpt from the pledge said, according to the Daily Beast. ‘There is no limitation to what kind of pain I am willing to endure for my Master.’ 

Francis has vehemently denied these allegations.  

Accusations against Francis and his extreme BDSM practices came in a June Facebook post from Victoria Chan, who claimed to have been ‘groomed’ for the ‘cult’ since she was 14. 

William ‘Control’ Francis, frontman for emo rock band Aiden, is being accused of sexual abuse by more than 20 women

Francis is pictured on the ground while his bandmates 'beat him' - which was part of the group's rock/emo appearance

Francis is pictured on the ground while his bandmates ‘beat him’ – which was part of the group’s rock/emo appearance

One woman, Jude Valentine, posted photos to Facebook of her black and bloody eye which she alleges was caused by William Control 

Chan made a point to emphasize that ‘to her knowledge, William Control has not had sex with any underage girls’.

The Facebook post reads: ‘William and another woman who had been grooming me [from] a young age had started to get worried about people noticing that I was texting him,’ she said in the post. ‘Concerned about my age, it was encouraged for me to change his name on my phone and also to ‘date’ someone of my own age to avoid suspicion.

‘I’m very lucky to have got out when I did. 

‘William is currently making his money from an unknown number of sexual slaves. Some live in a house together already and others work as forced sex workers giving him control of their lives.’

Chan continued by claiming that she has been in contact with almost 20 women who have similar stories and were ‘unable to consent’ because of ‘mental health instability.’

Francis took to his official William Control Facebook page on June 7 to share how even though he is into BDSM, it has been with consent.

‘I went into the police for questioning about these allegations earlier this year,’ he said in the post. ‘After showing the detective my side of the story, including private communication, he recommended no charges be pressed, because it was clear the behavior was consensual.’

Francis was adamant that he no longer engages in ‘that sort of play anymore’ and called the allegations against him ‘lies.’

He added: ‘I have never been with underage girls. I have never been involved in a ”sex cult.”’ 

The following day, Francis took to Facebook again to share that he was ‘shutting everything down completely.’

‘I’m sorry to everyone but it’s best that I focus on my family and not have any more communication with the outside world,’ Francis responded. 

One of the alleged victims – named Lily – shared how when she responded to Francis’ apology, the band member sent her a private DM showing ‘evidence’ of a consensual relationship between the two.

The evidence included ‘sexually explicit text messages’ and ‘pictures and videos you sent me,’ the woman – who spoke on the condition of anonymity – stated. She shared the screenshots of the messages with the Daily Beast.

‘I’ve spoken to my lawyer. He’s mounting the paperwork for a defamation of character lawsuit,’ the messages from Francis read. ‘We’ve got all that we need to seek damages in the tens of thousands.’ 

His alleged victims say some would be forced to get 'branded' with a tattoo of his initials 

His alleged victims say some would be forced to get ‘branded’ with a tattoo of his initials 

Women claimed that Francis would groom women and girls to participate in a 'sex cult' with many joining as teens

Women claimed that Francis would groom women and girls to participate in a ‘sex cult’ with many joining as teens

Lily, now 25, claimed that she was a ‘big fan’ of Aiden while she was a preteen and added that she ‘loved his solo project’ as well. 

She claimed Francis told her she was ‘beautiful’ while at a Fort Lauderdale show in 2012. 

Lily added that ‘he had been waiting for me to turn 18, cause I had also met him prior at another show, I think the year before’ and that they finally did have a sexual encounter on his tour bus. 

‘Then a few months later, we’d been texting, and he kind of propositioned like whether or not I’d like to be his ”slave,” and being 19 and not really having any kind of direction at that point, I was like sure,’ Lily stated. 

‘And what kind of ensued was this awful, abusive relationship under the guise of BDSM. And he had me sign a contract, and the contract had to be signed in my blood. 

And a few other women have said that… He also at some point wanted me to get a tattoo, like a way of branding without actually calling it branding, but I never got the tattoo. 

He wanted me to change my appearance, lose weight—I developed an eating disorder. There were rules, and he would make me film myself doing various degrading sex acts.’ 

Lily shared that she drove to an Orlando show in November 2012 ‘as part of my ”Slave duties.”’ 

She then shared: ‘So that night, it was just, maybe the sex started out consensual, but it was just brutal, way beyond like spanking or biting, it was like he broke skin when he bit me and I was crying, and there was a point where he had said, ‘I can’t do this if you’re going to f****** cry like that.’ 

‘And then he flipped me over and I definitely said no, and I was definitely still crying, and he anally raped me. And then he left me there to go sound check for his show.’  

Lily detailed that once in a group message with other women, someone finally dropped the word ‘sex cult’. 

Jude Valentine posted text messages she says were sent to her by William Control 

Jude Valentine posted text messages she says were sent to her by William Control 

Francis took to his official William Control Facebook page on June 7 to share how even though he is into BDSM, he makes sure he gets consent

Francis took to his official William Control Facebook page on June 7 to share how even though he is into BDSM, he makes sure he gets consent

‘And everyone was sharing photos of their tattoos, their brandings, and just going over these horrible, awful things,’ she stated. ‘They were in it for longer than I was. It was six months, and then after the Orlando incident I knew I had to get out of there.’ 

Francis would go on and send messages to Lily’s friend, who went on Twitter and sent the same pictures and texts from ‘one of her last emails.’

Lily asserted that those messages were from some of their first encounters together but she added that she did back down from the discussion after Francis continued sending the same threat to her friend. 

‘It’s because I’m afraid of him and he has these videos and images of me, like if he could find that text so easily, god knows like what else he still has,’ he said. 

Like Lily, Victoria took solace in finding community among others survivors of the alleged abuse. 

William Control also has a brand Submit Clothing

William Control also has a brand Submit Clothing

She shared a Tumblr that ‘a collective of the girls have set up’ so that they could share information pertaining to the allegations. 

Included in the posts are numerous examples of graphic images, videos and statements from the women. 

Women appear with W tattoos on their crotches, hips, ribs and chest. 

‘The W and roses was the first part. I later got him to write ‘whore’ on me and had that tattooed on,’ on W tattoo caption stated.

‘The lyrics are his and were added summer 2017. He made out that only the select few got collared, and an even more select few were allowed to be branded. It felt like such an honor at the time. Now I know there are countless women walking round with his initial on their p****.’

One woman claimed that when she wouldn’t do the tattoo, ‘he tied me down and carved his initial into my chest.’ 

One alleged victim – Sarka J – shared posts of Western Union transactions that were paid to Francis for ‘his needs’ and ‘the future [he] had been planning for me.’ 

She sad: ‘I couldn’t consent because I was scared to death. I couldn’t consent because of the loaded gun being forcefully pulled to my mouth which is definitely the threat of force. 

‘I couldn’t consent because being beaten to the pulp isn’t definitely the right way how to be consensual and trying to refuse always meant only more torture until I gave up. I couldn’t consent because being beaten heavily with fists to my face and head temples as well as being choked made me unconscious.’

She told Salty that she was extorted for $100,000, a similar trend of ‘financial domination’ that alleged victim, Stormie Somers, recalled. 

‘Even if he didn’t need the money, it was still my job to supply him with money. I was going to get signed on to Burning Angel to be a porn star, because that’s what he told me I was going to do,’ Somers said.

A longtime girlfriend of Francis, Somers posted videos of support to his other accusers and stated: ‘If you were f****** whipped and beaten and had to go to the hospital, I hear ya.’ 

Somers shared that she suffered a collapsed throat, dislocated jaw and black eyes in the course of her nine year relationship with Francis. 

The woman worked to recruit and groom other women to join while also working for Francis as a cam girl, stripper and dominatrix. 

‘What [Francis] considers BDSM—basically he just beats the s*** out of you and brainwashes you to believe your sole purpose is to serve him and to worship him and that’s your job,’she said. ‘ It went from crossing lines of consent to totally physical annihilation.’ 

Somers shared of an instance when she visited him to Los Angeles and he proceeded to repeatedly punch her in the face and beat her severely. 

‘I thought I died,’ she shared ‘I was watching him f**k me unconscious, and I couldn’t do anything about it… He’d never done anything like that.’ 

Continuing with the abuse, Somers stated that she witnessed abuse against numerous other women conducted by Francis. 

He allegedly made two women get married so one could get a green card. The woman – Amanda – posted a photo with Francis in March on Instagram.

Many women said they were financially extorted from thousands of dollars, just because Francis told them too

Many women said they were financially extorted from thousands of dollars, just because Francis told them too

In messages, Francis allegedly accused Amanda of signing an NDA but the woman claims that she never signed one. 

Another alleged victim – named Sarah – claimed that she had to buy ‘expensive shoes, the posh clothes, the fancy hotels, the flights, the shirts for his son’ and that she even made Francis sole beneficiary of her will when he told her to change it. 

Sarah was found to have sent between $331 to $529 to William Francis/William Control LLC.

While Sarah was forthcoming and said that most of the physical contact was consensual, most of her grievances were emotional and physical. 

She added that the photos and videos he had of them were taken without her consent. 

Sarah added: ‘He also twice sent me pictures of him having sex with other women. I doubt they gave their consent either. That’s one reason why I’m frightened to do anything about all of this, in case he publishes any of it as revenge porn.’ 

For Somers, the coalition forming among all the survivors gives her some solace. 

‘Seeing all these women come forward, in a f****d up way it was such a relief,’ she said. 

‘Hearing so many other stories that are similar to mine, I felt like finally someone believed me. I felt validated for what I had experienced, and for so long I was told I was crazy and it didn’t happen. 

‘Nobody in their right mind would want to create this kind of stuff. No one can consent to rape. I didn’t have control over it, I couldn’t say no. None of these poor girls could say no. You say no and you get his wrath twice as hard.’            



Read more at DailyMail.co.uk