Ex-cops convicted of sexual assault
BY ELIZABETH AHLIN
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
SIOUX CITY, Iowa - Life has been some version of hell ever since the early morning hours of April 18, 2008.
That morning, sometime around 2 a.m., a Creston, Iowa, woman has testified, two police officers cornered her behind the bar in a local country club, where one stroked her hand and shushed her while the other man raped her.
"The nightmare that will haunt her dreams the rest of her life had been born," Assistant Attorney General Andrew Prosser said in his closing arguments.
The jury deliberated Thursday afternoon and evening in the case against former Creston Police Chief James Christensen, 41, and former Assistant Police Chief John Sickels, 39. Around 10 p.m., jurors found the men guilty of second-degree sexual abuse. Both had pleaded not guilty. Each now faces a potential prison sentence of 25 years.
Christensen and Sickels were fired from their police jobs following their June arrests. On Thursday, they were led away in handcuffs by Woodbury County sheriff's deputies. They are not eligible for bail.
Sickels has said he had consensual sex with the bartender. Christensen said he was outside urinating when the sex began. He walked in on Sickels and the bartender, he testified, but he didn't realize what he had interrupted.
The jury went into deliberations just before 2 p.m. Thursday, after about four hours of closing arguments.
During those arguments, Prosser told jurors that the woman's story was consistent and believable because she told the truth. He said Christensen and Sickels made "no sense," because their stories changed repeatedly during interviews with agents from the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation. He used video clips from their taped interviews to make his point.
First, the men both said nobody had sex with the bartender. Then, Sickels said he put his hand down the bartender's pants. Later, Sickels said he and the bartender did have sex.
In his closing argument, Richard McConville, Sickels' attorney, criticized the prosecutors' use of the video clips, saying they reduced hours of interviews with division agents to sound bites that best benefited the prosecution.
McConville also hammered the woman's credibility, saying she was wrong on several points, including who was at the bar that night, who was drinking what, and when people arrived at and left the country club. In one instance, McConville said, the woman said Sickels had been drinking whiskey and coke. But several other witnesses said he was drinking beer.
"Is that a big deal? Maybe not," said McConville. "The only problem is, she's absolutely sure it happened."
Defense attorney Paul Scott questioned the bartender's actions after the alleged assault.
Why didn't she go to the hospital? Why didn't she call the sheriff? Because she had "nothing to report," he said.
He also pointed to her testimony that she went home and got into bed, asking why she didn't take a steaming shower.
Scott, the attorney for Christensen, had described the rape accusation as false.
"Every person's worst nightmare is to be accused of a crime that you did not commit," Scott said.
It was the eighth day of the trial for jurors, who have heard from the woman, both defendants and agents with the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, among other witnesses. The trial was moved from Union County at the request of the defense, because of extensive news coverage of the case.
The woman, 45, still lives in Creston but no longer works at the country club. She hopes to become an elementary school teacher. |
