Charlo man pleads guilty to assault and sexual assault
POLSON — A Charlo man pleaded guilty to two separate charges of assaulting a minor and sexual assault in District Court Wednesday morning. Marvin Camel signed plea agreements for both charges.
Camel pleaded guilty to the amended offense of sexual assault with bodily injury and according to court documents, he will serve a two-year suspended sentence. He’s also asked to enter and complete sex offender treatment or serve 120 days in jail.
POLSON — A Charlo man pleaded guilty to two separate charges of assaulting a minor and sexual assault in District Court Wednesday morning. Marvin Camel signed plea agreements for both charges.
Camel pleaded guilty to the amended offense of sexual assault with bodily injury and according to court documents, he will serve a two-year suspended sentence. He’s also asked to enter and complete sex offender treatment or serve 120 days in jail.
Camel will be declared a level 1 sex offender.
The offense stems from a January 2009 incident in which he allegedly raped a young woman he had met at a bar earlier that evening.
According to court documents, Camel met the alleged victim and her friend at the Pablo Bar and offered to give them a ride to a nearby party.
After getting lost, Camel told the women he would take them home; he dropped off the alleged victim’s friend at her residence, but then headed to a dark, secluded spot in the woods.
Court documents state that once there, Camel forced the woman to have sex and throughout the attack asked her, repeatedly, if she was frightened. After the assault, the woman fled from the vehicle to a nearby residence where she immediately called police and named Camel as her attacker.
When Polson police talked to Camel later that night, the defendant denied any wrongdoing.
Police re-interviewed the defendant a few days later, and during that interview, informed him that DNA evidence indicated that he’d had sex with the alleged victim. At that point, according to court documents, Camel admitted that the young woman had been in his car and that they might have kissed, but continued to deny having sex with her or forcing her to have sex.
The maximum penalty for this case would have been life in prison and a fine of $50,000.
Camel also pleaded guilty in a seperate case to assaulting a minor offense. According to the plea agreement, he will get a five-year suspended sentence and a fine of $1,000. The offense stems from a May incident in which Camel, according to a female witness, assaulted her five-year-old child.
Court documents state that Camel began rough-housing with the child in the back of the woman’s vehicle after she picked up the defendant and his friend. Camel’s behavior toward the child allegedly became increasingly violent and included choking, biting and banging’s the boy’s head against the car window.
Even though the mother begged him to stop, Camel allegedly refused and instead continued to abuse the boy and mock him for crying.
According to court documents, the woman called police later that day, and the responding detective observed scratches and bite marks when he interviewed the little boy.
The maximum penalty for the case would have been five years in jail and a $50,000 fine.
Sentencing on both cases are set for Wednesday, July 25 at 9 a.m.