NORTHAMPTON — A new jury trial has begun for a former physical therapist from South Hadley previously convicted for indecent assault and battery on a patient, who is now facing two counts of rape after another alleged victim came forward.

Edward Kostek, 44, sat attentively in the courtroom on Wednesday, occasionally sipping from a bottle of water as both the woman he was previously convicted of sexually assaulting in 2019 and the woman who came forward with the new allegations stemming from 2012 testified against him in Hampshire Superior Court. As a matter of policy, the Gazette does not identify victims or alleged victims of sexual assaults.

In opening arguments before the jury, prosecutor and Assistant District Attorney Andrew Covington laid out a narrative of events detailing the two rape charges against Kostek, who saw the woman as a patient while working as a physical therapist at Cooley Dickinson Hospital in 2012. The woman had been recommended to Kostek by her primary care physician in 2012 after she injured her back by slipping on the ice after leaving the gym.

“Mr. Kostek not only violated his patient’s trust, but every standard of human decency,” Covington said. “She [the alleged victim] grew up believing to trust doctors. She couldn’t imagine that someone like the defendant would harm her, would violate her in this way.”

The woman testified that during their first session together, Kostek took her to a private room, instructed her to remove all her clothing and inappropriately touched private areas of her body. At her second appointment, she was again asked to remove her clothes and this time, the woman alleged Kostek touched her private areas inappropriately before proceeding to digitally penetrate her multiple times.

“I froze, because I didn’t know what was happening,” the woman testified regarding her first session with Kostek. “I didn’t know what to do. I was scared.”

Although she initially did not come forward, the alleged victim later felt the need to due to having a mutual acquaintance with the woman who Kostek has previously been convicted of indecent assault against. That incident occurred in 2019, with Kostek being found guilty of touching her improperly over the course of several sessions during treatment for a neck injury the victim had sustained.

Though the victim in the first case also testified in court on Wednesday, jurors were not privy to the fact that Kostek had already been convicted of indecent assault against her. Judge John Agostini instructed the jury that the testimony could only be used to establish a common pattern of operation or criminal intent in the current case.

Defense attorney Luke Ryan posited an alternate narrative in his opening argument, casting the alleged victim as someone with monetary problems looking to financially benefit by accusing Kostek.

Following Kostek’s previous conviction, the woman in that case had filed a civil suit seeking $225,000, which was settled in 2023 for an undisclosed sum.

Ryan noted that shortly after the alleged incident took place in 2012, the alleged victim in the current trial had sent Kostek a Facebook friend request and had communicated with Kostek in a friendly manner on the social media platform.

“[She] believed there were things to gain and little to lose,” Ryan said. “The truth was written in that Facebook message, and the truth is very simple. Edward Kostek never harmed [the woman].”

Ryan also cast doubt on the other victim Kostek was convicted of assaulting, saying her frequent marijuana use and distrust of medical professionals led her to misconstrue what had happened to her was assault. Ryan instead claimed that Kostek was examining scar tissue left by breast augmentation surgery in order to test for Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a condition that can lead to joint pain and abnormal scar formation.

The trial will continue on Thursday, with further witness testimony expected in the case.

Alexander MacDougall can be reached at amacdougall@gazettenet.com.