INVESTIGATIVE

Monterey District Attorney Paid Biden Accuser Tara Reade $2,800 to Testify as Expert

Records show that Tara Reade testified a dozen times as a purported expert in domestic violence cases. But her credibility now is under scrutiny after it came to light that Reade apparently inflated her academic credentials and may have lied under oath. 

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According to records from the District Attorney’s office in Monterey County, prosecutors paid Alexandra Tara McCabe, aka Tara Reade, $2,844.18 to serve as an expert witness in five different criminal cases since 2018.

That includes paying her mileage to drive from her homes, first in Grass Valley and later in Nevada City, to Salinas and Monterey for testimony that in two instances took several days.

Reade, who accused presidential candidate Joe Biden of sexually assaulting her when she worked for him as an aide more than 20 years ago, is now being accused of inflating her academic credentials for her work as an expert witness on domestic violence, which she may have lied about under oath.

According to the records, Reade most recently received $670.50 to testify in a criminal case on December 10, 2019.

In all, according to Monterey County Deputy Assistant District Attorney Cristina Johnson, Reade testified twelve different times as an expert in domestic violence cases, eleven times in front of a jury and once solely in front of a judge, during what’s called an in limine, or preliminary motion regarding limiting testimony, hearing.

 According to trial testimony obtained by NBC Bay Area, Reade testified under oath that she earned a political science degree from Antioch University in the Seattle area and that she had served for 5 years as a visiting professor there.

But a spokeswoman for Antioch University confirmed to NBC News that Reade only did administrative work there and the University has no record of her ever graduating with a degree.

In an email to NBC News, Reade described her position at the university as an "affiliate faculty online as needed to help students with life learning and BA completion." She also sent screenshots of "unofficial" transcripts that she said showed that she'd earned the degree.

NBC News forwarded the images to the school, which declined further comment.

Prosecutors and defense lawyers tell NBC Bay Area they are now reviewing all of those criminal cases where Reade served as an expert witness to see if those cases need to be reopened given the questions surrounding Reade’s veracity.

Click here to read our past story on Reade

This spring, Reade publicly accused Joe Biden of sexually assaulting her in 1993 during the time she worked in his US Senate office in Washington, D.C.

Dozens of people who worked in that office around the same time have told reporters they don’t recall any such incident or even allegations of anything like it ever occurring.

Biden has vehemently denied the allegations.

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