By Arun Kumar

Washington, June 13 (IANS) Indian-born celebrity fashion designer Anand Jon, already accused of sexually assaulting a dozen women and girls, has been slapped with charges of attacks on six other women.
With the addition of 13 new counts by Los Angeles County prosecutors Tuesday, Jon, 33, now faces 46 criminal charges. Among the 40 felonies and six misdemeanours are rape, lewd acts on a child and false imprisonment. If convicted on all counts, Jon could be sentenced to life in prison.

"He is a prolific serial sexual predator," said Jane Robison, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles district attorney's office, cited by local media.

The Beverly Hills designer, whose full name is Anand Jon Alexander, is accused of assaulting or molesting girls and women ages 14 to 27, many of whom were seeking work as models.

The alleged incidents occurred from August 2000 to March 5, Robison said.

Many of the alleged assaults occurred in Jon's Beverly Hills condominium. Jon was arrested March 6 after one of the alleged victims went to Beverly Hills police.

Prosecutors Tuesday sought to increase Jon's bail to $2.3 million from $1.3 million. Jon was free on bail with conditions, including that any model age 30 or younger who works with him must sign a release and have a guardian present.

Authorities in New York and Texas have also opened investigations into whether the designer assaulted women there. Robison said Dallas authorities have obtained a probable cause warrant to transfer him and to face charges.

Jon's attorney, Ronald Richards, has said the designer did nothing wrong. He added the accusers are models who made false allegations against Jon because he refused to employ them to the extent they wanted.

Jon is a well-known figure in the celebrity fashion world and designed clothes for celebrities like heiress Paris Hilton, singer Mary J. Blige and Norah Jones others. He was involved in the show, "America's Next Top Model" and was planning to star in a reality TV show for VH1 about the fashion world.

He graduated from the prestigious Parsons School of Design and launched his own label at New York Fashion Week in 1999. A December profile of Jon in Newsweek touted him as a "person to watch" in 2007, while his own website claims he is the winner of various fashion awards including a 2002 People's Choice "Best New Designer" prize.



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