A Rock Springs woman and her boyfriend have both agreed to plead no contest to charges that they included a teenage girl in their group sex acts for more than a year.
Sweetwater County Chief Criminal Deputy Attorney Micaela Lira filed a plea agreement Tuesday in the case of 40-year-old Jennifer Renee Fahrney, offering a 25 to 35-year prison sentence and a demand of $4,600 in restitution, in exchange for the dismissal of 43 of the 66 felony-level counts.
Fahrney and her attorney signed the agreement Monday, as did the prosecutor.
For Fahrney’s boyfriend Richard Allen Turner, 57, Lira filed a May 29 plea agreement (also signed by Turner and his attorney) promising life in prison without parole on five of the original 19 counts, which include subsequent offenses of first-degree sexual abuse of a minor, plus other sexual abuse charges. Turner would plead no contest, the agreement says.
Costs, fees and assessments would be at the discretion of the court in Turner’s case.
Turner, however, is disputing whether his court-appointed public defender Rachel Weksler struck the best deal possible. He filed a handwritten letter to the court May 29, saying he believed he could get a better deal.
“This is my life we are talking about,” wrote Turner. “(The prosecutors) need to meet me half way.”
Sweetwater County District Court Judge Suzannah Robinson, in response, scheduled a hearing for Thursday, where Turner can argue for different representation, his court file says.
Court Docs Say…
An evidentiary affidavit filed in Fahrney’s case says she incorporated a teenage girl into sex acts with her boyfriend, Turner, over the course of more than a year — and that she watched Turner perform sex acts with the girl as well.
When Rock Springs Police Department Detective Jennifer Saloga interviewed the girl, the girl said someone had helped her inject meth into her arm since she didn’t know how. She also told the detective that she had sex with Turner, the affidavit says.
The girl would not say who injected meth into her, Saloga added in the document.
Saloga executed three search warrants: one for Turner’s phone, one for Fahrney’s phone and one for the girl’s cellphone.
The detective found child pornography on Turner’s phone, an affidavit in his case says.
Saloga found text messages on Fahrney’s phone, the affidavit said. Fahrney was coordinating with a contact, saved as “My Biggest Mistake,” to have sex with various people, including the girl.
Court documents say investigators found numerous child pornography files on Turner’s phone, and that the alleged victim admitted that Turner had performed sex acts on her or with her numerous times.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
