Rose McGowan says she will plead not guilty when she’s arraigned Thursday on a drug charge outside Washington, D.C.
The Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority says McGowan surrendered to Airports Authority Police on Tuesday. She’s charged with possession of a controlled substance.
“Ms. McGowan appeared in Loudoun County, Virginia, on Nov.14, 2017, to accept service of the Airports Authority Police arrest warrant, and she was released on a $5,000 unsecured bond,” a spokesperson for the police department said.
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The felony charge stems from what prosecutors say was cocaine found among McGowan’s personal belongings left behind on a Jan. 20 flight to Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia.
An airport employee allegedly found McGowan’s wallet with two bags of white powder inside.
Following her release, the actress spoke to the New Yorker’s Ronan Farrow.
McGowan explained to Farrow that she carried a slim card wallet with her on the trip to Washington and had not taken the wallet out of her bag, which was allegedly left unattended when she went to the washroom mid-flight.
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“I had it in the side pocket of my backpack, and I left it on my seat as I went to the bathroom,” the 44-year-old actress told Farrow.
McGowan then realized her wallet was missing when she arrived at baggage claim. She said she tweeted United Airlines to help her find the wallet.
She said that a detective later contacted her and told her to come get her wallet. McGowan said she feared it was a fake officer as she believed she was being followed, following a tweet several months earlier about being raped by a “studio head.”
McGowan has since named Harvey Weinstein as her alleged sexual abuser. Weinstein, through his spokesperson, has denied “any allegations of non-consensual sex.”
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“I was going to ASAP but then things started to get really weird. I knew I was being followed and that I wasn’t safe,” McGowan said.
Jim Hundley, McGowan’s lawyer, argues that the drugs could have been planted while the wallet was missing and the actress denies she uses cocaine.
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She says that cocaine was the last thing on her mind at the time as she was on her way to attend the Women’s March. “Imagining I’m going into sisterly solidarity, I can think of nothing more opposed to that, energetically, that I would want in my body at that moment,” McGowan told Farrow.
“I will clearly plead not guilty,” McGowan said.
McGowan claimed that the warrant for her arrest was part of a conspiracy to silence her, in a tweet from Oct. 30.
“Are they trying to silence me? There is a warrant out for my arrest in Virginia. What a load of HORSESH**,” she tweeted.
—With files from the Associated Press
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