For those who aren't familiar with the case, a recap. Koppenhaver faced a preliminary hearing in court earlier this week on 34 charges relating to allegations of sexual assault, kidnapping and attempted murder. The charges relate to an incident from August last year in which Koppenhaver is alleged to have broken into the house of former girlfriend, Christy Mack, and proceeded to savagely beat, imprison and sexually assault her. The assault made headlines when Mack posted a photograph of her extensive injuries while recuperating in hospital. Meanwhile, Koppenhaver was on the run and using Twitter to maintain his innocence, tweeting things like, "I'm not a bad guy. I went to surprise my gf, help her set up her show and to give her an engagement ring and ended up fighting for my life."

Christy Mack Credit:Getty Images

The use of the words 'fighting for my life' is ironic, given the extent of the trauma inflicted on Mack. Here are the allegations laid out. On the night of August 8, 2014, Koppenhaver allegedly broke into Mack's house and discovered her sleeping next to her friend Corey Thomas. Mack and Thomas had been due to attend a tattoo convention the next day, but on seeing Thomas, Koppenhaver allegedly assaulted him for a period of around ten minutes before directing him to leave the house and not call the police. Thomas complied.

After this, Koppenhaver allegedly began striking and kicking Mack, telling her, "That's my pussy and I'm going to take it back now." Mack says Koppenhaver then tried to rape her. She says she only managed to escape the assault when he returned to the kitchen. From the clinking sounds she could hear, Mack believes he was searching for another knife. She ran to a neighbour's house for sanctuary, where the police were called. Koppenhaver managed to escape and then spent a week on the run before being arrested by US marshalls.

While this manhunt was underway, Mack faced the indignity inflicted on so many survivors of violence particularly when gender dynamics are at play. Despite the photographic evidence of her injuries (which included a liver so ruptured that doctors elected to delay operating on her traumatised face because they feared that anaesthesia could pose a threat to her life), Koppenhaver still found support in people who believed Mack had 'asked for it' by committing a range of sins - she was with another man, she had a history of working in adult films, she was a 'whore', she had rejected him.