A SWAT unit was sent Wednesday afternoon to a Deerfield Township home.
Warren County dispatchers said police were called to a domestic violence call on Auburn Place. The incident was determined to be a false alarm and SWAT is no longer on the scene, dispatchers say.
The incident remains under investigation.
MasonBuzz will update this story.
A judge declared a mistrial Friday after a Warren County jury reported being hopelessly deadlocked on whether a Mason man sexually assaulted and raped his girlfriend’s 9-year-old daughter.
Jorge Velasquez, 33, had been charged with one count of rape of a child and a lesser charge of gross sexual imposition. He pleaded not guilty to both charges.
The jury of eight women and four men deliberated for just over five hours Friday before reporting to Warren County Common Pleas Court Judge James L. Flannery that they could not reach a verdict.
The jury split 6-4 in favor of acquittal with two jurors undecided, according to defense attorney Justin Bartlett, who spoke with jurors after the proceedings.
Prosecutors will retry the case, said Assistant Warren County Prosecutor Theresa Hiett.
Velasquez took the stand Friday in his own defense to counter allegations made by the now 14-year-old girl, who says he fondled and digitally penetrated her when she was 9.
The girl testified Thursday that she regarded Velasquez as a father figure. Velasquez and the girl’s mother have two other children together.
The alleged abuse began when her mother began working the night shift in late summer of 2006, leaving her and a toddler brother home alone with Velasquez, the girl said.
The abuse stopped several months later when her mother stopped working the night shift, she said.
“He told me not to tell my mom or else,” she told jurors. “I was scared because I thought if I told someone he would hurt me or anyone in my family.”
Both Velasquez and the girl’s mother testified that the girl fabricated the accusations to retaliate against Velasquez for preventing her from seeing an adult boyfriend.
“Nothing ever happened,” Velasquez told the jury. “[The victim] just said it now because [she] wants me in jail out of the way. She wants me to leave her alone so she can be with him.”
The boyfriend, Nehemias Cristobel, testified Friday that the victim confided in him last year about the alleged abuse and that he encouraged her to report it.
Under cross examination, Cristobel, now 22, admitted his relationship with the girl began when he was 20 and she was 12, but insisted that her mother and Velasquez approved of it on the condition their dates were chaperoned.
“Everyone tells lies in this world but I don’t think she would tell a lie this big,” he said.
The girl’s mother and the defendant’s brother, Guillermo Velasquez, both testified that the abuse could not have happened because the girl stayed overnight with relatives on days her mother worked the night shift.
The girl’s mother painted a portrait of an unruly and out-of-control teenager who made the accusations five years after the alleged incidents in response to efforts by her and Velasquez to prevent her from seeing Cristobel. When she tried to take away the girl’s cell phone, a gift from Cristobel, the girl struck and pushed her, she told jurors.
The mother said she did not report the incident to police because she is an undocumented immigrant and feared deportation.
Defense attorney Justin Bartlett attacked the girl’s credibility, pointing out inconsistencies in her story and arguing that she has a history of lying.
“Our position is that they’re acting as reasonable parents. They’re trying to prevent their daughter from engaging into a relationship with an adult,” he said. “She’s upset because her parents are trying to reel her in, control her.”
Hiett questioned the financial motives of the mother in protecting Velasquez, the family’s breadwinner, and asked the jury to consider why a teenage girl would fabricate such “detailed and imaginative” abuse allegations.
“It would have been a lot easier for her to turn around and say this never happened. There were alternatives for her and yelling rape was not the first one,” said Hiett.
“It’s always the child’s word against the perpetrator’s word. When is a child’s word enough?”
Bartlett said he was not surprised that the trial ended with a hung jury and said the case hinged on the accuser’s credibility.
“There was the credibility of one person versus three witnesses that came forward to testify consistently,” he said. “I thought it could have been a mistrial; obviously we were hoping for an acquittal.”
If convicted, Velasquez faces a prison term of up to life on the rape charge and 36 months on the charge of gross sexual imposition. He remains in the Warren County Jail on a $500,000 bond.
No new trial date has yet been set.
Is Jorge Velasquez a concerned stepfather or is he a sexual abuser and child rapist?
That’s the question before jurors in Warren County Common Pleas Court as they decide the fate of the accused Mason man.
Testimony wrapped up in the second day of trial for Velasquez, 33, who’s charged with one count of rape of a child. Velasquez has entered a plea of not guilty to the charge, which carries a penalty of up to life in prison.
Prosecutors added a lesser charge of gross sexual imposition for jurors to consider. The charge, a third-degree felony, carries a prison term of up to 36 months.
The case went to the jury of eight women and four men shortly before 1 p.m.
Velasquez took the stand today in his own defense to counter allegations made by the teenage daughter of his girlfriend, who says he fondled and digitally penetrated her when she was 9.
The girl, now 14, testified Thursday that the alleged abuse began when her mother began working the night shift in late summer of 2006, leaving her and a toddler brother home alone with Velasquez.
The victim testified that the abuse began with the defendant fondling her in bed and then escalated to digital penetration. The abuse stopped several months later when her mother stopped working the night shift, she said.
“He told me not to tell my mom or else,” she told jurors. “I was scared because I thought if I told someone he would hurt me or anyone in my family.”
Although Velasquez and the girl’s mother are unmarried, the girl testified she regarded him as a father figure. Velasquez and the girl’s mother have two other children together.
Velasquez vehemently denied the allegations. Both he and the girl’s mother testified that she fabricated the accusations to retaliate against him for preventing her from seeing an adult boyfriend.
“Nothing ever happened,” he told the jury. ”[The victim] just said it now because [she] wants me in jail out of the way. She wants me to leave her alone so she can be with him.”
The boyfriend, Nehemias Cristobel, testified today that the victim confided in him last year about the alleged abuse and that he encouraged her to tell her mother or a teacher.
Under cross examination, Cristobel, now 22, admitted that his relationship with the girl began when he was 20 and she was 12, but insisted that her mother and Velasquez approved of it as long as their dates were chaperoned.
He told the jury that an adult man dating a minor child was more socially and culturally acceptable in his native Guatemala, where both the victim and defendant also immigrated from.
“Everyone tells lies in this world but I don’t think she would tell a lie this big,” he said.
Velasquez said the abuse could not have happened because the girl stayed with Velasquez’s brother and sister-in-law overnight on days her mother worked the night shift.
Guillermo Velasquez took the stand Friday and told jurors that his brother, the defendant, was never permitted to be left alone with the girl. The girl’s mother testified Thursday that she did not trust Velasquez to be left alone with her daughter.
In her closing argument, Assistant Warren County Prosecutor Theresa Hiett questioned why Guillermo Velasquez and the girl’s mother did not notify police about the defendant’s alleged lack of access to the girl.
“Would any of us allow a family member to sit (in jail) when you know you have the ace card in hand?” she asked.
Hiett suggested the girl’s mother might be protecting Velasquez for fear of the financial instability that could result should he be convicted and sent to prison. Velasquez testified that he is the family’s primary breadwinner, although “not by much.”
She asked the jury to consider why a teenage girl would fabricate such detailed allegations of abuse.
“It would have been a lot easier for her to turn around and say this never happened. There were alternatives for her and yelling rape was not the first one,” said Hiett.
“It’s always the child’s word against the perpetrator’s word. When is a child’s word enough?”
Defense attorney Justin Bartlett attacked the girl’s credibility, pointing out inconsistencies in her story and arguing that she has a history of lying.
“Our position is that they’re acting as reasonable parents. They’re trying to prevent their daughter from engaging into a relationship with an adult,” he said. “She’s upset because her parents are trying to reel her in, control her.”
MasonBuzz will update this story.
Depending on who you ask, Jorge Velasquez is either a concerned and loving stepfather or a sexual abuser and child rapist.
A 14-year-old teenage girl told a Warren County jury Thursday that she was sexually abused and raped by the Mason man — her mother’s live-in boyfriend — when she was 9 years old.
The girl’s mother however, took the stand to paint a different portrait of an unruly and out-of-control teenager who fabricated the accusations to retaliate against Velasquez for preventing her from seeing an adult boyfriend.
The victim was the first witness in the trial of Velasquez, 33, that started Thursday in Warren County Common Pleas Court. Velasquez is charged with one count of rape of a child for the alleged incident, which prosecutors say took place between August 2006 and December 2006.
Velasquez has entered a plea of not guilty to the charge, which carries a penalty of up to life in prison.
The girl said the alleged abuse began when her mother began working the night shift in late summer of 2006, leaving her and a toddler brother home alone with Velasquez.
Although Velasquez and the girl’s mother are unmarried, the girl testified she regarded him as a father figure. Velasquez and the girl’s mother have two other children together.
The victim testified that the abuse began with the defendant fondling her in bed and then escalated to digital penetration. The abuse stopped several months later when her mother stopped working the night shift, she said.
“He told me not to tell my mom or else,” she told jurors. “I was scared because I thought if I told someone he would hurt me or anyone in my family.”
The girl said she confided about the abuse last year to her 22-year-old boyfriend, who encouraged her to seek out a counselor at school. The school reported the accusations to police and to her mother, whom the girl says didn’t believe her claims.
“That made me feel mad,” she said. “My own mother couldn’t believe me.”
The girl’s mother took the stand today and told jurors the abuse could not have happened because she left the girl overnight with a relative on days she worked the night shift.
She testified that the teen made the accusations five years after the alleged incidents in response to efforts by her and Velasquez to prevent her from seeing the adult boyfriend. When she tried to take away the girl’s cell phone, a gift from the boyfriend, the girl struck and pushed her.
With the help of a translator, the mother told jurors she did not report the incident to police because she is undocumented immigrant and feared deportation.
Defense attorney Justin Bartlett attacked the girl’s credibility, pointing out inconsistencies in her story and arguing that she has a history of lying.
“The case falls on credibility,” he told jurors. “The state will ask you to speculate and presume without any evidence. She didn’t like what her parents were telling her. It’s her word versus his word and the mother’s word.”
Testimony will resume at 8:30 a.m. Friday. Bartlett says his client intends to take the stand in his own defense. The trial is expected to wrap up on Friday.
Velasquez has been held at the Warren County Jail on a $500,000 bond since his Nov. 29 arrest.
The Enquirer reports:
Already sent to federal prison for her role in a multimillion dollar mortgage fraud scam, Jolie Neal now faces charges she stole from an amateur basketball team.
On Wednesday, a Hamilton County grand jury indicted Neal, 48, of Mason, for felony theft.
She is accused of stealing $28,000 from Cincinnati’s Finest Basketball Club, her son’s team where she was a parent volunteer.
Neal pleaded guilty last summer to fraud in federal court. Her boyfriend, former University of Cincinnati basketball player and TV commentator, Anthony Buford, also pleaded guilty in the scheme.
They were convicted of defrauding several lending institutions out of $2.8 million by obtaining nine loans on three Mason properties and spending the money on personal items instead of paying off the existing mortgages.
Neal and Buford each were sent to prison for 41 months last week in that scheme.
Jury selection is underway in Warren County Common Pleas Court in the case of a Mason man accused of raping a child.
Jorge Velasquez, 33, is charged with one count of rape for allegedly engaging in sexual conduct with a child who was “living separate and apart” from him and who was less than 13 years of age. Court documents list the age of the child as 9.
Velasquez has entered a plea of not guilty to the charges. A jury trial is scheduled to start Thursday and last two days.
Prosecutors say Velasquez, the longtime boyfriend of the girl’s mother, digitally penetrated the girl’s vagina. The alleged crimes happened in Mason between August 2006 and December 2006, according to prosecutors.
The charge, a first-degree felony, carries a penalty of up to life in prison.
Velasquez has been held at the Warren County Jail on a $500,000 bond since his Nov. 29 arrest.
Jennifer Edwards-Baker reports:
Douglas Boucher, 39, of Mason died after a 2009 tasing incident with Mason Police. Boucher's family has filed a a lawsuit in federal court against the city, police department and two officers involved. . Provided photo
The family of a man who died in 2009 after Mason police shocked him with Tasers has filed a lawsuit in federal court against the city, police department and two officers.
The suit alleges Officers Daniel Fry and Sean McCormick used “dangerous” and “excessive” force by essentially torturing Douglas Boucher, 39, who was mentally ill when he died on Dec. 13, 2009, after he was Tased in the parking lot of a Speedway gas station. He fell and struck his head on the pavement.
Filed by renowned Cincinnati civil rights lawyer Al Gerhardstein, the suit demands a jury trial and seeks compensative damages and legal costs.
It also asks for punitive damages against the officers, not the city.
“They tortured him when he was on the ground and obviously incapacitated,” Gerhardstein said Tuesday. “They gave him a command, he did not comply and rather than check and see if he had a medical problem, they kicked him and used a (baton) on him. They also Tased him five times in a a row before they realized he was incapable of responding to commands, and that’s what torture is.”
Gerhardstein also alleges in the suit the officers failed to “spark test” their Tasers before they used them so the current that ran through Boucher’s body may have been higher than the manufacturer specifies.
He said he obtained the download off of the devises and it shows the officers’ Tasers hadn’t been sparked tested for 10 days.
Boucher’s autopsy results showed he died from a skull fracture from the fall.
The report did not blame the use of Tasers for the cause of death.
City and state investigations into the incident cleared the officers of wrongdoing in Boucher’s death.
Former Warren County Prosecutor Rachel Hutzel determined that the state investigation and evidence in his death indicated the officers did not commit a criminal act during the Dec. 13 incident.
Neither officer faced internal discipline because they were found to have followed the police force’s policy and procedures, Mason spokeswoman Jennifer Trepal has said.
Calls to Mason’s city manager and police chief were not immediately returned Tuesday.
In in a court filing, a lawyer for the city, Gary Becker, denies all allegations the officers violated Boucher’s constitutional rights and asks that the suit, which was filed on Dec. 9, be dismissed.
Posted in: City Council, Crime, News |
Jorge Velasquez: Warren County Jail
A Mason man accused of raping a child will appear in Warren County Common Pleas Court today.
A pretrial hearing is set for 2 p.m. for Jorge Velasquez,who’s charged with one count of rape for allegedly engaging in sexual conduct with a child who was “living separate and apart” from him and who was less than 13 years of age. Court documents list the age of the child as 9.
Velasquez, 33, has entered a plea of not guilty to the charges. A two-day jury trial is set to begin Feb. 16 in Warren County Common Pleas Court.
The alleged crimes happened in Mason between August 2006 and December 2006, according to prosecutors. The charge, a first-degree felony, carries a penalty of up to life in prison.
Velasquez is being held at the Warren County Jail on a $500,000 surety bond. He is ordered not to have contact with minors under the age of 18 should he post bail.
10:37 a.m. Update: The sentencing for Andrew Keith has been re-scheduled to a later unknown date. MasonBuzz will update this story when details are available.
A Mason man who pleaded guilty to molesting boys at his mother’s West Chester in-home day care will be sentenced this morning in federal court.
Andrew F. Keith faces at least 30 years in prison, but federal prosecutors are pushing for a maximum 80 year prison sentence for the 27-year-old Keith, who pleaded guilty to child pornography charges in May.
“Andrew Keith has spent his entire adult life sexually exploiting children,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Christy Muncy wrote in her sentencing memorandum to the judge. ”He used his mother’s in-home daycare as a personal hunting ground for victims.”
Keith admitted in May that he abused and photographed at least three young boys from 2002 to 2003, traded those images with others and collected 600 photos of child pornography on his computer.
Prosecutors say he obtained many of those images by bartering with other pedophiles over the internet, swapping his images of abused children for theirs “as if they were baseball cards.”
Keith’s mother, Teresa Bailey, was convicted in November of one count of endangering children and one count attempted endangering children. She was sentenced to 12 months in prison on each of the charges, to be served concurrently.
An evaluation of Keith found that he had been abused as a child, but prosecutors say that does not minimize the harm he has done or the danger he poses.
“There is significant need to protect the public from further crimes of the defendant,” Muncy wrote.
MasonBuzz will update this story
Dan Horn contributed to this story.
Jeff Braley, then the lead detective for Hamilton Township Police, testifies in the second murder trial of Ryan Widmer, of Mason. File photo
Janice Morse reports:
The former detective from the Ryan Widmer murder case testified for about a half hour Monday in an unrelated federal court civil-rights trial, denying allegations that he and other officers “conspired” to raid an adult birthday party under false pretenses.
“I didn’t put together anything, sir…I did not plan anything,” Jeff Braley, a former police lieutenant, said in response to a question from Konrad Kircher, a lawyer representing Ted and Mary Pritchard of Hamilton Township and two other people.
Kircher questioned Braley about events surrounding the 2007 incident on the Pritchards’ property.
Kircher did not ask Braley about his employment credentials as part of his testimony today, although Kircher was allowed to explore that topic in a pretrial deposition.
Braley has denied making false statements found in his employment records. He resigned last year after an investigation into those documents.
In the Pritchard case, the family and their partygoers allege that nearly two dozen officers stormed the property in 2007 based on unsupported suspicions of underage drinking, court records say. The party was being thrown for Ted Pritchard’s 52nd birthday and for the Pritchards’ son’s 21st birthday, Kircher said.
The Pritchard family later learned that the raid happened partly because a Hamilton Township officer’s wife called the Hamilton Township police department from her Butler County home, pretending to be calling from Warren County and reporting she heard loud noise coming from the Prtichards’ party, court records say.
Prospective jurors in the Pritchard case denied recognizing Braley from the highly publicized Widmer case, which ended with Widmer, now 31, who last lived in Mason, being convicted in the 2008 bathtub drowning of his wife. His case went to trial three times before he was convicted a year ago. Only two of the prospective jurors in the Pritchard case said they followed any phase of the Widmer case closely.
Posted in: Crime, News, Widmer Trial |
