Showing posts with label WY. Show all posts
Showing posts with label WY. Show all posts

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Craigslist rapists get 60 to life - ad seeking someone with "no regard for women" led to rape

Both men involved in the rape of a woman after a Craigslist ad was placed to solicit it were sentenced to 60 years to life in the Wyoming prison system. Natrona County District Judge David Park sentenced both Jebidiah James Stipe, now 28, and 26 year old Ty Oliver McDowell to 60 years to life for their role in the brutal attack, an attack which left the victim, a woman Stipe once dated, traumatized.

Stipe plead guilty to 5 felonies including conspiracy to commit sexual assault. McDowell also plead guilty to 5 felonies, including 3 counts of 1st degree sexual assault. Stipe's sentencing was held Monday, June 28 and McDowell's sentenced was handed down Tuesday, June 29. The ad solicited the rape of a woman seeking a "real aggressive man with no concerns for women well being interested let me know."

Stipe, a 28-year-old Carbon County native, paid for the ad that led McDowell to a 25-year-old woman's west Casper residence and impersonated the woman in online communications with McDowell. The ad appeared on Dec. 5, reading, in part, "Need a real aggressive man with no concerns for women well being interested let me know," according to an affidavit from the case.

Less than a week later [On December 11, 2009], McDowell showed up at the victim's west Casper residence. Once inside, the victim -- weighing less than 100 pounds -- struggled to fight, biting and scratching McDowell. Unable to escape, she was raped by a penis and a knife sharpener found in the home after the assault. Her wrists were bound so tightly together a nurse later thought they were broken. Then she was raped and left naked and tied in her living room, bruised from head to toe. An investigation by the Natrona County Sheriff's Office revealed Ty Oliver McDowell, who carried out the rape, was led to the 25-year-old victim's Casper home after responding the bogus Craigslist ad Stipe posted.

During the sentencing, the victim said that "It's very hard for me to trust people and not question what their intentions are.[Stipe] turned my world upside-down. I don't understand why someone would do something as violent and as vicious as he did." Sgt. Michael Steinberg testified that Stipe had requested that similar things happen to other women, including his ex-wife. The ex-wife, according to Steinberg, had to change vehicles and move back into her parents' house.

George Doherty, a witness presented by Stipe's defense attorney Vaughn Neubauer, said that he believed Stipe, an ex-Marine who served in Iraq, suffered from PTSD. Neubauer said that "Something happened inside Mr. Stipe. Something happened. But that something can be addressed, he can be salvaged."

District Attorney Michael Blonigen showed how the rape was planned and that Stipe had a change to back out of the devious (and deviant) scheme, but did not. "This defendant had every opportunity in the world to stop this. Mr. Stipe could have pulled back. Instead, he pushed the throttle forward."

After Stipe's sentencing, Blonigen said that the Craigslist rape was the worst he had seen over his 27 years as a prosecutor. "We were satisfied with the sentence. Sixty years to life for a 28-year-old man is virtually a life sentence. I really think that it's because of the courage of the victim that we're here today."

Ty Oliver McDowell was a technician for a hospital who lived in Bar Nunn, Wyoming when he raped the woman. Just before his 60 year to life sentence, he addressed Judge Park, the victim, and Stipe. "I am terribly sorry that (she) had to go through this nightmare. I'm sorry that I put her through it...I forgive [Stipe]for tricking me and deceiving me into doing this."

After McDowell made his statement, the victim went to the front of the court and addressed how the rape impacted her life. "This is something I will never get over. My family have been the ones to pick up the pieces of something he tore apart for something he thought was a game."
 
Toward the end of her statement, choked with tears, she said, "I'm sorry." "That's all right," Natrona County District Judge David Park told her. "You don't need to apologize."
 
District Attorney Michael Blonigen, speaking at McDowell's sentencing Tuesday, said if someone is going to solicit a rape, "He has to find a rapist...I don't see a dime's worth of difference between the two," he said of McDowell and Stipe.

The prosecutor argued that McDowell's act were premeditated. He took pictures of the victim's home with his cellular telephone; communicated with Stipe in the days leading up to the rape; on another occasion checked the home's front and back door, finding them locked; and, on the day he committed the rape, carried with him a blindfold and rope to bind the victim's hands.

Blonigen said that McDowell's actions were that of someone who had not accepted accountability for his actions. "I do not see how any rational person can insist -- like Mr. McDowell continues to insist -- that this was a terrible misunderstanding. He has taken the charge, but he has not taken responsibility."
 
Both McDowell's attorney Tim Cotton and McDowell's parents described a man who was raised with good morals and to shun alcohol and drugs, but had "really began to lose touch." Cotton asked for a sentenced of 20 years, stating that it would allow his client to rehabilitate himself eventually while also "satisfying the demands of justice."
 
After McDowell's sentencing Blonigen stated that while Craigslist cooperated throughout the investigation, "I would like them to not take those sort of ads. But, as someone else has said, if they don't, someone else will. It boils down to personal (responsibility)."
 
He also reiterated that both Stipe and McDowell earned the identical 60 to life sentences and shared equal accountability. "Either one of these people could have stopped it at any time. The only person who couldn't have stopped it is [the victim]."

Sunday, February 14, 2010

Wyoming sex assault case highlights kids are not the only targets of online sexual predators

(AP) CASPER, Wyo. - Authorities say a Casper woman was assaulted at her front door, raped at knifepoint in her living room and left bound on the floor, and they say one of the men charged in the brutal attack claimed that he thought it was invited.

Two men are accused in the crime. One is charged with carrying out the rape. The other, the woman's ex-boyfriend, stands accused of posing as the victim online and claiming she harbored a rape fantasy and wanted to be assaulted.

The case in the central Wyoming city of Casper, population 54,000, illustrates that middle America isn't immune to the dangers of Internet anonymity and predators who target victims through online ads that hint at sex and prostitution.

Prosecutor Mike Blonigen, the Natrona County district attorney, declined to comment on the specifics of the ongoing rape case. But he said Internet cases generally pose a challenge to law enforcement.

  "Tracking down who's involved is relatively difficult," Blonigen said. "It's pretty easy to set up a false identity in cyberspace, so that's always an issue. And of course, they have to make some overt act to actually accomplish any of these things. We're not the thought police."

In the Casper case, Blonigen's office has charged Ty Oliver McDowell, 26, of Bar Nunn, a Casper suburb, with three counts of first-degree sexual assault, one count of kidnapping and one count of aggravated burglary. Jebidiah James Stipe, 27, a Marine based in Twentynine Palms, Calif., is charged with conspiracy to commit first-degree sexual assault. Lawyers representing McDowell and Stipe declined comment.

A few days before the Casper woman was raped, she had complained to the Natrona County Sheriff's Department that someone had made a false Craigslist posting about her, including photographs and personal information. The ad read, "Need a real aggressive man with no concern for women," authorities said.

Craigslist took the advertisement down when the woman complained. Yet prosecutors say it was posted long enough to catch the attention of McDowell, a medical technologist.

According to a statement filed in court by Natrona County Sheriff's Deputy Todd Sexton, McDowell waived his right to remain silent and talked to deputies investigating the case. "McDowell admitted to going to the victim's residence ... and having sexual contact with (the woman) to fulfill a 'rape fantasy' for her," Sexton wrote.

McDowell told investigators that he had corresponded with a person he thought was the woman at an e-mail address featured on the advertisement, Sexton wrote. However, prosecutors charge that McDowell was actually communicating by e-mail with Stipe, the woman's former boyfriend. They say Stipe posted the ad to set the woman up for the attack without her knowledge.

The San Bernardino County (Calif.) Sheriff's Department on Dec. 16 arrested Stipe, a private first-class in the U.S. Marine Corps then stationed at Twentynine Palms. A spokeswoman for the Marine Corps said Stipe enlisted in July 2001 and, "was being processed for administrative separation as a result of a pattern of misconduct at the time of his arrest."

The Casper case is one of several sex crimes to grab headlines recently in which the Internet linked perpetrators and victims. Law enforcement officials around the country also have in the past accused Craigslist of promoting prostitution.

Scrutiny of Craigslist increased significantly when prosecutors in Boston last year charged that former medical student Philip Markoff used Craigslist to arrange a meeting with masseuse Julissa Brisman. He's accused of shooting her to death last April and of attacking other women he met through the site.

In 2008, Craigslist agreed to tighten its adult services advertisements as part of an agreement with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and with the attorneys general for 43 states and territories, including Wyoming.

Under the agreement, Craigslist started requiring a working telephone number and charging a small credit card fee for each such ad. "Requiring credit card verification and charging a fee to post in this category raises accountability to a point where we expect few illicit ads will remain," Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster said in November 2008 in a joint statement with the state prosecutors and the children's center.

Craigslist didn't respond to an e-mail sent to their San Francisco headquarters seeking comment on the Wyoming rape case, although a company phone message requests that press inquiries be made by e-mail.

Blonigen, the Casper prosecutor, said Craigslist was cooperative with Wyoming investigators. "I would prefer that they maybe not run these ads," Blonigen said. "You know somebody's going to do it even if they don't."

Wyoming State Sen. Tony Ross, R-Cheyenne, is a criminal defense attorney and chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee in the state Legislature. He said the committee may have to consider whether state law is up to the challenge of dealing with sexual predators who prowl the Internet. "The world is changing so rapidly here, particularly with regard to Internet, cyber crimes, and things like that, that we're going to see a whole new evolution of law, it seems to me," Ross said.

(Update 2-14-10) Last Tuesday, Ty Oliver McDowell, the alleged actual rapist, appeared before Judge Scott Skavdahl and entered a not-guilty plea in Natrona County District Court. He is being charged with conspiracy to commit sexual assault, which carries a maximum life sentence. He's being held on $250,000 bond in the Natrona County Detention Center and his trial is scheduled for late April.

His codefendant, Jebidiah James Stipe, the victim's ex-"boyfriend," is being held on $500,000 bond. He's yet to be arraigned.

Saturday, October 24, 2009

Sex offender convicted of raping wife at gunpoint in vehicle, motel

A Laramie, WY man faces a minimum of 20 years and a maximum of life for kidnapping then raping his wife at a park, then motel. A jury of 10 women and 2 men convicted Donald Ray Daves of 4 counts of 1st degree sexual assault, 5 counts of using a firearm while committing a felony, and single counts of kidnapping, aggravated battery, and possession of a deadly weapon with unlawful intent.

The 46 year old perpetrator's conviction stemmed from a incident which occurred over the couse of two days. According to the victim and prosecutors, Daves' assault began April 4 at the Monolith Ranch public access area to purportedly dig up jewelry he buried. The gunpoint sex assaults at the access area occurred in Daves' Ford Ranger pickup truck. After Daves finished raping his victim there, he drove around, looking for a motel to stay.  According to Albany County Attorney Richard Bohling, Daves unsucessfully rented a room at a Howard Johnson's. “He reminded her if she runs he’ll blow a hole in her head the size of a coffee mug,” Bohling said about the threats the perpetrator made to his victim.

Eventually, Daves rented a room at the 1st Inn Gold, where he raped his victim three times, each time with the semiautomatic handgus laring on the stand next to the bed. According to Bohling, the gun on the stand was used to keep the victim submissive. “This is all about power. It’s not about consensual sex.”

After he finished raping his wife, he dropped her off at her home April 5, threatening to kill her if she told. The next day, Daves fled and led  police on a high speed chase after Laramie and Albany County Sheriff’s officers attempted to question him about the rapes.

Public defender Vaughn Neubauer focused on the physical evidence and the victim’s testimony.

Neubauer said the victim had lied on the stand because she wanted Daves out of her life. “Don’s an easy target,” he said. “She had the perfect opportunity to get rid of Don Daves forever.”

Neubauer asked the jury to remember the victim’s testimony and how she became “defensive and angry and hostile” during cross examination after crying earlier in the day. “Her testimony was contrived. She made it up,” he said. “Someone … who can turn it on, turn it off and turn it on again is capable of doing that.”

Concerning the physical evidence, Neubauer said the DNA analysis performed by the Wyoming State Crime Lab and the biological materials tests performed by Laramie Police Sgt. Michael Ernst were non-factors.
He reminded the jury that the DNA analysis and presence of fluids on Daves’ underwear could not be used to determine if the sexual acts were consensual or non-consensual. Neubauer added that Ernst failed to find any biological evidence inside Daves’ pickup truck, which is where the victim had said Daves had forced her to perform oral sex.

In addition, Neubauer referred to the testimony of Dr. Jonna W. Gies of the Ivinson Memorial Hospital Emergency Department, who performed a sexual assault examination of the victim on April 9. In her testimony on Tuesday, Gies had said there was no evidence of tearing or redness on the victim. Gies had said there were two bruises on the victim’s inner thighs. However, she admitted they could have happened during consensual or non-consensual sex.

Because the physical evidence could not prove Daves had sexually assaulted his wife, Neubauer said the prosecution’s case depended on the victim’s testimony and circumstantial evidence. “What this case really comes down to is whether you believe (the victim) beyond a reasonable doubt,” he said. Neubauer also pointed to the events in the front lobby of the Howard Johnson’s Hotel on the night of April 4 to show the victim was with Daves on her own volition.

Jeffrey Becker, a former Howard Johnson Hotel front desk manager, testified on Wednesday that the victim could have escaped out the front door or spoken to him while Daves was in the restroom.“She had a number of options available to her,” Neubauer said. “She could have asked for help, but she didn’t.”

Then, instead of fleeing the county or holding the victim hostage, Daves took her home before returning to his residence.
 
Bolling rebutted the defense argument by stating in his closing that “There’s no handbook of how to be a victim of crimes like this...Some people spend years in (an abusive) situation before they ever get out.”
 
Daves is being held without bail in the Albany County Detention Center until sentencing.

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Mexican national sentenced to lengthy prison term for rape

September 4, 2008
Reported by Associated Press

A district judge has sentenced a man to serve 45 to 50 years in prison on convictions of kidnapping a woman in Shoshoni and raping her at knifepoint last December.

District Judge Nancy J. Guthrie on Tuesday [September 2] sentenced 21-year-old Jesus Jurado Soto-Cruz, originally of Mexico, to the maximum possible sentence.Authorities plan to deport Soto-Cruz back to Mexico after he serves his sentence.Soto-Cruz pleaded guilty last month. Authorities say he kidnapped the 19-year-old victim from the parking lot of a Shoshoni convenience store and raped her.Soto-Cruz then returned the woman and her car to the convenience store.Fremont County Sheriff's deputies arrested him after following his tracks in the snow to a nearby housing complex.

Thursday, December 27, 2007

25 to 50 years for sexual attacks at Jackson, WY bar

Two men who carried out a plan to rape women while the women were drunk or alone were sentenced to 25 to 50 years in prison. They tried to rape a woman, but she screamed and they ran away. They followed a second woman after the first attempt, and were more sucessful the second time around.

AN excerpt fro the Casper Star-Tribune, Men get 25-50 years for rape

The victim helped Jackson police create a computer-generated composite drawing. Aguilar and Juarez were identified by a man who drove them home the night of the attacks.

Days after that incident, the two men, along with two other accomplices, Federico Lopez and Gustavo Bonilla, fled to Mexico where they were arrested and extradited back to Wyoming in June. Lopez and Bonila pled guilty to 3rd degree sexual assault and were sentenced to 4 years in prison.

More from the story:

District Judge Gary Hartman said he couldn't even contemplate rehabilitation for Armando Aguilar, 25, or Daniel Juarez, 21."The goal in this case is punishment," Hartman said. Each man pleaded guilty in October to first-degree sexual assault. Each also pleaded guilty to a charge of accessory before the fact to third-degree sexual assault in a separate attack.