Post by WaTcHeR on Feb 3, 2006 11:10:20 GMT -5
02/03/2006 - The Bullitt County man who claimed he thought he was following a police officer’s orders when he sexually humiliated a teenaged McDonald’s worker in April 2004 pleaded guilty this morning to sexual abuse, sexual misconduct and unlawful imprisonment.
A charge of sodomy, which could have sent Walter W. Nix Jr., to prison for 20 years, was dropped as part of a plea bargain to which he agreed to a five-year prison term.
Nix, who will be formally sentenced on March 15, agreed not to seek probation at sentencing, and Commonwealth’s Attorney Mike Mann agreed to take no position on shock probation, which could be granted later.
Nix is the first person to be convicted in the 2004 hoax at the Mount Washington McDonald’s in which Louise Ogborn, a $6.35 hour counter worker, was strip-searched and sexually humiliated for nearly four hours after a man pretending to be a police officer called the store and said he was investigating the theft of a purse from a customer.
Nix, 43, was scheduled to be tried today before Bullitt Circuit Judge Tom Waller. The judge asked Ogborn if she supported the plea bargain and if so why. She said she did because it will require Nix to serve time in prison, to register as a sex offender and to testify against David N. Stewart, the alleged perpertrator of the hoax.
Stewart, a former private prison guard from Fountain, Fla., is scheduled to be tried April 18 on charges of impersonating a police officer and soliciting sodomy for allegedly making the hoax call. Law enforcement officials have said they suspect Stewart was behind at least 69 other hoaxes at businesses in 32 states from 1995 through 2004. He has been charged only in Bullitt County, and has pleaded not guilty.
Nix had been called in to the restaurant to watch Ogborn by assistant manager Donna J. Summers, to whom he was engaged at the time.
Summers, who led the search of Ogborn and is charged with unlawful imprisonment, is set for trial Feb. 22. She was fired by McDonald’s and called off her engagement to Nix after viewing a security video showing what transpired in the restaurant’s office. She also has pleaded not guilty.
Yesterday was the second time that a plea deal was proposed in Nix’s case.
In November, Waller rejected as too lenient a deal in which Nix would have gotten one year’s probation. He also cited Ogborn’s concern that it wouldn’t have required Nix to register as a sex offender. That agreement also would have allowed Nix to plead under a provision that allowed him to deny his guilt at the same time he acknowledged there was enough evidence to convict him.
In a lawsuit set for trial March 30, Ogborn alleges that McDonald’s knew about previous hoax calls, including many to its own restaurants, and failed to protect her.
McDonald’s has contended that Ogborn should have realized that Stewart, 38, wasn’t a police officer, and that Ogborn, Stewart and Nix are responsible for whatever damages, if any, she suffered Ogborn fired her orginal lawyers, William C. Boone Jr. and Steven Yater, and this week retained new counsel — Lea Player and Ann Oldfather — according to court records.
A charge of sodomy, which could have sent Walter W. Nix Jr., to prison for 20 years, was dropped as part of a plea bargain to which he agreed to a five-year prison term.
Nix, who will be formally sentenced on March 15, agreed not to seek probation at sentencing, and Commonwealth’s Attorney Mike Mann agreed to take no position on shock probation, which could be granted later.
Nix is the first person to be convicted in the 2004 hoax at the Mount Washington McDonald’s in which Louise Ogborn, a $6.35 hour counter worker, was strip-searched and sexually humiliated for nearly four hours after a man pretending to be a police officer called the store and said he was investigating the theft of a purse from a customer.
Nix, 43, was scheduled to be tried today before Bullitt Circuit Judge Tom Waller. The judge asked Ogborn if she supported the plea bargain and if so why. She said she did because it will require Nix to serve time in prison, to register as a sex offender and to testify against David N. Stewart, the alleged perpertrator of the hoax.
Stewart, a former private prison guard from Fountain, Fla., is scheduled to be tried April 18 on charges of impersonating a police officer and soliciting sodomy for allegedly making the hoax call. Law enforcement officials have said they suspect Stewart was behind at least 69 other hoaxes at businesses in 32 states from 1995 through 2004. He has been charged only in Bullitt County, and has pleaded not guilty.
Nix had been called in to the restaurant to watch Ogborn by assistant manager Donna J. Summers, to whom he was engaged at the time.
Summers, who led the search of Ogborn and is charged with unlawful imprisonment, is set for trial Feb. 22. She was fired by McDonald’s and called off her engagement to Nix after viewing a security video showing what transpired in the restaurant’s office. She also has pleaded not guilty.
Yesterday was the second time that a plea deal was proposed in Nix’s case.
In November, Waller rejected as too lenient a deal in which Nix would have gotten one year’s probation. He also cited Ogborn’s concern that it wouldn’t have required Nix to register as a sex offender. That agreement also would have allowed Nix to plead under a provision that allowed him to deny his guilt at the same time he acknowledged there was enough evidence to convict him.
In a lawsuit set for trial March 30, Ogborn alleges that McDonald’s knew about previous hoax calls, including many to its own restaurants, and failed to protect her.
McDonald’s has contended that Ogborn should have realized that Stewart, 38, wasn’t a police officer, and that Ogborn, Stewart and Nix are responsible for whatever damages, if any, she suffered Ogborn fired her orginal lawyers, William C. Boone Jr. and Steven Yater, and this week retained new counsel — Lea Player and Ann Oldfather — according to court records.
