Mouna's Story

Mouna’s Home Was Stolen at Gunpoint

The Night of November 16, 2017

On November 16, 2017, Tasha Kaminsky encouraged^[1] a group of eight people^[2] to confront Mouna at their home. The group came armed.^[3] What followed was a violent, coercive encounter in which Mouna was surrounded, threatened, and ultimately forced to flee their own house. The group then occupied the house for seven months.

The entire encounter was audio recorded. Tasha has since spent considerable time and energy discussing this recording online, referring to it as “The Tape” and characterizing it as a “candid confession.”^[4] In reality, “The Tape” documents a coordinated act of armed intimidation, not a confession of any kind.

What “The Tape” Actually Captures

“The Tape” is roughly two hours long. In it, Mouna can be heard being told to kill themselves^[5] and having that suggestion reiterated even after Mouna disclosed that they had recently considered suicide. Mouna was threatened with a gun.^[6] They were told, repeatedly, that they must leave their own home or be physically removed.^[7] They were ordered to end their relationship with their partner, regardless of what either Mouna or their partner wanted.^[8] They were gaslit with outright falsehoods, including being told they were wrong about Tasha’s age by five years.^[9]

After Mouna left, the group celebrated on the recording. They can be heard bragging: “We just took a fucking house from someone.”^[10] One declared, “I’m taking over that third floor tonight.”^[11] Another announced, “This is our palace. If the police come we’re gonna shoot the fuckers.”^[12] They laughed together about how they had used guns to frighten Mouna into compliance.^[13]

Tasha’s False Narrative About “The Tape”

Tasha has worked to reframe “The Tape” as something it is not. She has publicly called it a “candid confession from my rapist,”^[14] describing it as “two hours of a guy^[15] acting like describing being a serial rapist is the same as sharing what he ate for breakfast.”^[16] In telling this story, she ignored the threats on Mouna’s life, the power dynamics of an eight-against-one armed confrontation, and the coercive conditions under which every word on “The Tape” was spoken.

Most critically, Tasha claimed that Mouna said the words “I raped Tasha” on “The Tape.”^[17] She told this to multiple people using direct quotation marks, as though repeating Mouna’s exact words. She told Jordan Ault that Mouna “goes on to say ‘I raped Tasha.’”^[18] She told Rodney Brown that Mouna “literally said ‘I raped Tasha.’”^[19]

Those words do not appear anywhere on “The Tape.” Tasha admitted this under oath.^[20]

Tasha knew from the very beginning that those words were never spoken. In November 2017, shortly after the confrontation, she asked Sawyer (Claire Caplain) whether Mouna had “straight up” said such things. Sawyer told her no. What the group had actually done was pose leading questions like “do you think you abused Tasha?”^[21] Tasha knew the truth and chose to tell people the opposite.

What Mouna Actually Said, and Why

The statements Mouna made on “The Tape” were not confessions. They were the words of a person surrounded by armed people, being told what to say, trying to survive.

Mouna testified that roughly ten minutes into the encounter, they were told how they were going to answer: “there’s going to be no more debate about these things.”^[22] The group posed leading, closed-ended questions rather than listening passively.^[23] Mouna testified that they were “trying to deescalate the situation” and “scared for my life.”^[24]

The statements Tasha has pointed to as supposed admissions are, in context, conditional and reflective. Phrases like “if she felt like I pressured her, I can imagine that’s true”^[25] are not confessions. They are the words of someone trying to pacify a group of armed people who had already demonstrated a willingness to use force.

The Lie About Not Knowing “The Tape” Existed

Tasha repeatedly claimed in public that she did not know the recording existed.^[26] This was false, and it was a lie she planned in advance.

Tasha learned about “The Tape” within hours of the confrontation. On November 17, 2017, at 11:54 AM (roughly twelve hours after the encounter), Sawyer told her about it. When Tasha asked “Did you record it?” Sawyer replied, “Dhoruba did, like all three hours.”^[27]

After learning about the recording, Tasha took concrete steps that show she took it seriously: she told her attorney about it and requested a copy.^[28]

Then, knowing all of this, Tasha and Blithe planned what she would say publicly. Together, they crafted a story: that she “thought the recording was long gone” and was “blindsided with recent news” about it.^[29] She then told others that she “didn’t know the recording existed” and that “it was withheld” from her.^[30]

This was not confusion. It was not a failure of memory. It was a deliberate, premeditated lie designed to control how people understood “The Tape,” a recording that documented coordinated violence against Mouna.

Weaponizing “The Tape” Against Others

Tasha did not limit her false narrative about “The Tape” to private conversations. She pressured numerous public figures^[31] using these fabricated claims, working to recruit others into attacking Mouna and anyone perceived as supporting them. This campaign of pressure extended well beyond the events of November 16, 2017, and relied on the credibility of claims that Tasha knew to be false.