Actress Allison Mack was released from federal custody Tuesday on $5 million bail and placed under house arrest, the Associated Press reports.
Mack, best known for her long-running role on The CW’s “Smallville,” was arrested Friday for her involvement in the organization NXIVM, which authorities say is a sex cult. A federal judge in Brooklyn agreed to release Mack to her parents in California, where she will decide whether or not to strike a deal with federal prosecutors
Mack is accused of recruiting women into the organization, and of “directly or implicitly” requiring these women to have sex with NXIVM founder Keith Raniere, according to U.S. attorney Richard P. Donoghue. She has pleaded not guilty to sex trafficking, and if convicted, she faces 15 years to life in prison.
In March, Raniere was arrested in Mexico, where he fled after the publication last fall of a New York Times report about NXIVM practices like branding women. Federal authorities say Raniere and Mack created a secret society within NXIVM in 2015 called “DOS,” which “operated with levels of women ‘slaves’ headed by ‘masters,’” and that some of the DOS slaves became masters who “directly or implicitly required the slaves to have sex with Raniere.”
Raniere has since been charged with sex trafficking, sex trafficking conspiracy, and conspiracy to commit forced labor.
Mack starred on “Smallville,” from 2000 to 20011, where she played a young Superman’s best friend.