By Gary Ogle
gogle@wbcowqel.com
A Bucyrus man not yet 20 for another month agreed to plead guilty to sex charges Friday afternoon in Common Pleas Court to avoid trial next week on a more serious rape charge.
Nineteen-year-old Kalab Atwell pleaded guilty to a Bill of Information on charges of third-degree felony sexual battery and fourth-degree gross sexual imposition. In exchange for those guilty pleas, Crawford County Prosecutor Ryan Hoovler agreed to dismiss the charge of first-degree felony rape stemming from the same incident for which Atwell was scheduled to go to trial next week.
The victim was an underage minor when the incident occurred.
Hoovler told the court he had contacted the victim and her family. “They are for the resolution and believe it is just and fair.”
Neither Atwell nor his attorney, Derek Dailey, had anything to say before sentencing. However, Judge Sean Leuthold did.
Discussing Atwell’s difficult childhood with him, Leuthold said, “Bad things happen to people all the time. People get bad breaks. The bottom line is you have to be the straightest arrow you can for the rest of your life. What you did was a terrible thing.”
The judge concurred with the agreed-upon sentence which he said took a lot of negotiations between Dailey and Hoovler. Atwell was sentenced to consecutive prison terms of 48 months out of a maximum 60 on the sexual battery charge and 11 months out of a maximum 18 on the gross sexual imposition charge. Those sentences will be served consecutively for a total of 59 months in prison.
Although Atwell was not fined, he is subject to a mandatory five-year period on post-release control once free from prison and will be considered a Tier III sex offender meaning he will have to register as such for the rest of his life.
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