A retired Riverton, Wyoming, firefighter is asking for more time to prepare for trial to contest claims that he targeted multiple women walking through town and sexually attacked them while giving them rides.
Charles Joseph Lawrence, 53, also may be getting closer to a plea agreement, his request for a new trial date says. He was originally scheduled for trial to begin Jan. 6.
Lawrence’s attorney Eric Phillips filed the rescheduling request Monday, because eight days prior, District Court Judge Kate McKay ruled that the case prosecutor can bring additional women in to testify against Lawrence at trial.
His two sexual assault charges are based on the claims of two women, who are alleged victims.
The additional two women, who aren’t alleged victims in any official charges, are expected to testify that they, too, were targeted by Lawrence while walking in town.
The defense argued that this evidence shouldn’t be allowed under the state’s rule against piling on evidence of “other acts” that could simply make a defendant look unsavory to a jury.
Case prosecutor Fremont County Attorney Patrick LeBrun conversely argued that these testimonies help to confirm Lawrence’s identity, method of operating and motive to knit together the sexual assault charges he already faces.
It’s Evidence
McKay detailed the proposed evidence in her Dec. 1 order, and accepted it as relevant and appropriate.
The two women who are not technically alleged victims are expected to testify about an incident from June 2, 2023.
One woman was out walking when Lawrence pulled up to her in a black Chevy pickup. He asked, then demanded, that she get in the truck. She was uncomfortable and had a bad feeling, so she refused, according to the account of the woman’s expected testimony.
Shortly after that, she watched the same truck pull up to another woman, whom the first woman didn’t know but had seen around and knew to have a developmental disability, the filing says.
“(The first woman) heard yelling, so she went to intervene, which caused the defendant to drive away,” says McKay’s account of the testimony.
The first woman consoled the second woman; and the second woman said the man wanted her to get in the truck so he could see her “boobs,” McKay’s filing relates.
Both women are expected to testify if there’s a trial. The one who is developmentally disabled is “handicapped, but she understands the difference between truth and lie,” the prosecutor told the court when arguing for the evidence.
LeBrun also plans to have Riverton Police Department Officer Tyler Larsen to testify at trial. Larsen questioned Lawrence about this incident after it happened and Lawrence admitted to offering both women a ride, the filing says.
Allowed
McKay lent significant analysis to whether this evidence has a greater chance of making Lawrence look unsavory to the jury than it has of knitting together or underpinning the charges he faces.
She decided it doesn’t, and the evidence will be allowed at trial.
Some factors she considered first included how “reprehensible” these reported acts are. They’re not as bad as the actual charges, the judge noted.
They do go to motive as well, McKay ruled.
She voiced some concern with the disabled witness, whom she said is likely to elicit sympathy from a jury. That makes the evidence a little more concerning. But that concern didn’t outweigh the other factors in favor of allowing this evidence, said the judge.
“Standing alone, the interactions with (these women) were not misconduct at all,” wrote McKay. “Nonetheless, the common features among each woman’s experience help to show that the defendant is the person who approached each woman … (and) show modus operandi (operating method).”
A new trial schedule has not yet surfaced in Lawrence’s file.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
