Porn star Ron Jeremy, 69, misses court hearing and is ordered to mental health facility after he 'had a breakdown in his jail cell and didn't recognize his own lawyer' as he faces trial on 21 sexual assault charges

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Disgraced porn star Ron Jeremy, who's facing 34 sexual assault charges, seemingly suffered a mental breakdown Thursday - just before his scheduled appearance at a downtown Los Angeles criminal court.

Jeremy, who turned 69 last weekend, was due in court to hear a judge's ruling on his motion to have the multiple charges split up into 21 separate trials - one for each of his accusers. 

But after a 45-minute wait for him to show up, bailiffs reported to Judge George Lomeli that they were having difficulty getting the X-rated actor from his cell to the courtroom.

After his defense attorney, Stuart Goldfarb, went to investigate, he came back to court and reported that Jeremy, whose real name is Ronald Hyatt, didn’t recognize him.

'I tried to get his attention - unsuccessfully,’ Goldfarb told the judge. 'He was unable to determine who I was.'

After hearing from a court bailiff that Jeremy was 'incoherent' and unable to follow orders, Lomeli referred the case to Hollywood Mental Health Court for a hearing on April 1 and ordered Jeremy's transfer to a mental health facility.

The judge did not rule on the motion to split the case into 21 separate trials.

Disgraced porn star Ron Jeremy (pictured in 2020), who's facing 34 sexual assault charges,  suffered a mental breakdown today, just before his scheduled appearance at a downtown Los Angeles criminal court

After hearing from a court bailiff that Jeremy was 'incoherent' and unable to follow orders, Judge Lomeli (pictured) referred the case to Hollywood Mental Health Court for a hearing on April 1

His defense attorney, Stuart Goldfarb (right), reported that Jeremy, whose real name is Ronald Hyatt, didn’t recognize him

The judge also ordered both defense and prosecution attorneys to schedule mental health experts' evaluations of Jeremy to be presented at another hearing in the LA Criminal Court on April 19

Jeremy has been indicted on 34 charges ranging from forcible rape to assault of girls as young as 15, during a span of 40 years.

He has pleaded not guilty to all charges and, up to now, he has been held on $6.6million bail at the Twin Towers jail in Los Angeles since his arrest in June 2020.

At a hearing last month, his defense team filed a motion asking for separate trials for each of the 21 women who've accused him.

His lawyers - Goldfarb and Kate Hardie - argued that the sheer number and varying nature of the allegations, which also include drugging women for sex and digital penetration, requires separate trials.

They also claimed Jeremy's civil rights would be violated if the charges were prosecuted together at one single trial that’s scheduled to start May 2.

'The sheer fact that Mr. Hyatt will have to defend himself against 24 accusers and 25 incidents that took place over the course of nearly 40 years will necessarily mean that his defense to every charge will not be the same,' his legal team maintained.

The lawyers cited two accusers who were underage at the time of their alleged attacks, one who said Jeremy digitally penetrated her at a rave when she was 15 and another who accuses Jeremy of raping her at 17.

'Hearing that Mr. Hyatt had allegedly assaulted minor victims would make it hard for the jurors in this case to judge him fairly on the allegations that did not involve minors,' the lawyers said in court documents.

Jeremy (pictured in 2020), who turned 69 last weekend, was due in court today to hear a judge's ruling on his motion to have the multiple charges split up into 21 separate trials

In 2013, Jeremy allegedly sexually assaulted a 38-year-old woman at one of his regular haunts, The Rainbow Bar and Grill, where several of his sex attacks happened, say prosecutors

The attorneys said that the same argument applied to accusations of drugging women for sex. 

'The implication that Mr. Hyatt drugged or poisoned [the Janes Does] is prejudicial and highly likely to inflame Mr. Hyatt's jurors.

'…Allowing Mr. Hyatt's jury to hear about dozens of allegations of alleged misconduct will prevent his jurors from judging him fairly on each charged count and from scrupulously applying the burden of proof.'

He is alleged to have sexually assaulted a 15-year-old girl referred to as 'Jane Doe 5' in 2004, penetrating her with a foreign object.

Another girl, 17 - 'Jane Doe 22' - allegedly was raped by him in 2008 at a home in Woodland Hills near LA.

In one of the first allegations against him, prosecutors claim he raped a 19-year-old woman during a photo shoot in the San Fernando Valley in 1996.

Later, he raped a 26-year-old woman at a party in a nightclub in LA in October 2000, officials said.

The indictment against him alleges that Jeremy 'unlawfully' had sexual intercourse with 'Jane Doe 19' in 2000 by means of 'force, violence, duress, menace or fear of immediate and unlawfully bodily injury.'

He also was accused of sexually assaulting another woman at a strip club in City of Industry at some point between 2002 and 2003.

Another woman, 21 - 'Jane Doe 23' - went to Jeremy's home in 2010 and said she was sexually assaulted there.

Charity Carson-Hawke accused former friend and porn star Ron Jeremy of sexually assaulting her at a hotel in May 2020. They are pictured together at the hotel on the day of the alleged attack 

Hawke, a property manager from Tampa, Florida, said she had been friends with Jeremy for decades and 'always trusted him'. The two are pictured together right in an old photo

In 2013, Jeremy allegedly sexually assaulted a 38-year-old woman at one of his regular haunts, The Rainbow Bar and Grill, where several of his sex attacks happened, say prosecutors.  

The West Hollywood bar on famous Sunset Strip is a popular hangout for rock 'n roll stars and movie actors. 

In an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com last month, Charity Carson-Hawke, 46, said that in May 2020 Jeremy pinned her against a hotel bathroom wall, grabbed her breasts, and tried to force her to touch his penis. 

Hawke, a Florida property manager, who had been close friends with Jeremy since 1996, reported him to police, sparking the investigation and arrest that prompted dozens of other women to come forward to law enforcement. 

She also sued the ex-porn actor in civil court, a case which Jeremy's lawyers agreed to settle this month for a 'substantial' undisclosed sum, believed to be over $1million.  

She revealed that in the days after the alleged assault, Los Angeles detectives convinced her to call the former porn star while they listened in.

'I never wanted to speak to him again. I was deleting him from my life. But I did wind up calling Ron with the detective on the other line,' she said.

'He admitted to it and started laughing which made me even more angry,' she said.

'I started cursing at him. He was just laughing like it wasn't a big deal to him. He was saying 'you know you wanted it'.' 

'Ron asked me, "Charity, come here. I want to show you something." I didn't even think anything of it because we've always been friends, and I'd always trusted him. I went to the bathroom.

Hawke told DailyMail.com in February she never imagined Jeremy 'would try that with me, a friend of his of 25 years' 

Hawke was in Los Angeles visiting a friend when Jeremy invited her to a party at the Highland Gardens Hotel, where he was staying, she said 

The former adult film star was hanging out at the hotel despite owning an apartment across the street

'That's when he slammed the door and pinned me up against the wall, got really aggressive with me.'

Hawke said she fought fiercely and shouted for help while he groped her breasts and tried to force her to touch his penis.  

'The five to seven minutes that I was struggling in the bathroom with him, I felt powerless,' she said. 'He tried with all his power to rape me that day.

'If it wasn't for me being so flexible, I wouldn't have gotten away.'

The mother of three said after she escaped the bathroom, she was confused, in shock – and scared for her friend, who Jeremy shifted his attention to after Hawke's rejection.

'I couldn't believe what he was trying to do to me,' she said. 'That he would try that with me, a friend of his for 25 years.

'Ron was all over my friend. She was drunk. I didn't want to leave her in his hands. I knew if I did something bad was gonna happen. 

The most recent allegations stem from January 2020 when Jeremy raped and sodomized a woman identified in the court documents as 'Jane Doe 17,' the indictment claims.

Jeremy, nicknamed 'The Hedgehog,' was raised in Queens, NY and worked as a special education teacher before turning to acting on Broadway, and later, X-rated movies.

He's been listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for the most appearances in adult films - 2,542 performance credits.

His porn career lasted from 1979 to 2018 and he also appeared in several mainstream movies, TV series and music videos.  

Ron Jeremy: The porn star who went mainstream before sex charges tanked his career

Prosecutors allege Jeremy - born Ronald Jeremy Hyatt - restrained some of the women and raped or sodomized them - and had sex with others who were sleeping or unconscious

Ron Jeremy, also known by his nickname 'The Hedgehog,' was born to a middle-class Jewish family in Queens, New York in 1953, according to his memoir Ron Jeremy: The Hardest (Working) Man in Showbiz.

He graduated from Benjamin N. Cardozo High School where he performed in theatrical productions including the musical Oklahoma, according to Village Voice.

According to his IMDB biography, Jeremy earned a masters degree from Queens College and became a special education teacher in the New York City area. 

He eventually left teaching to pursue becoming an actor on Broadway, and in 1978 had first brush with pornography when a girlfriend sent his photo to Playgirl magazine for appearance in its 'Boy Next Door' pages.

Jeremy has since been listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for 'Most Appearances in Adult Films' and won several adult film acting awards.

He has been listed as having 2,542 performance credits in the Internet Adult Film Database. He has directed an additional 296 adult films.

Jeremy, who was active as a porn star from 1979 until 2018, has also acted in a number of mainstream films and television series, including appearances in Ghostbusters and The Boondock Saints.

He has also competed on Wheel of Fortune and appeared in a segment of The Chappelle Show, and numerous music videos for artists including Kid Rock, Moby, Guns & Roses and Sublime.

Jeremy has also had several business endeavors including opening a swingers nightclub in Portland, Oregon which closed in 2015.