Don’t be glib. If it came out that my oldest friend wqs not only a rapist, but also used his fame and religion to silence the victims and avoid prosecution… AND I was involved with an organization with the express purpose of stopping sex abuse… I’d absolutely tell that friend to pound sand.
There were multiple times when I learned that friends of mine were sexually assaulted, some of those times were by people I considered friends. There’s zero chance that I’d do anything to “put in a good word” for the rapists I once called friends, because their actions in my company have ZERO baring on how they acted in private.
Tl;Dr: If you’re vouching for the upstanding nature of a convicted rapist based on your interactions when he wasn’t being a duplicitous rapist… that says more about your ignorance to how terrible that person can be as opposed to the good works you saw from the rapist when they weren’t raping. You’re also a victim.