Alleged rape victim testifies against former public defender - News - The Times-Tribune
http://thetimes-tribune.com/news/alleged-rape-victim-testifies-against-former-public-defender-1.1365680
Girl claims assaults at lawyer's hearing
Rape charges bound over to court
The 17-year-old Olyphant girl allegedly raped two years ago by a former Lackawanna County assistant public defender testified against him during a preliminary hearing Wednesday.
Kenneth Andrew Kovaleski, 38, was bound over to Lackawanna County Court on charges that include rape by forcible compulsion and involuntary deviant sexual intercourse with a person less than 16 years of age after the hearing before Magisterial District Judge Terrance V. Gallagher.
Mr. Kovaleski turned himself in to the Lackawanna County district attorney's office in July after charges were filed against him stemming from the victim's disclosure earlier that month.
According to the victim's testimony, the abuse began in June 2011 when she was 15. Mr. Kovaleski raped her and then warned her that "he knew all the DAs and all" and that no one would believe her if she reported him.
Mr. Kovaleski was a Lackawanna County public defender. He sued the county in 2008 when he was terminated, claiming then-Democratic commissioners Mike Washo and Corey O'Brien fired him because of his political affiliation, Republican.
Though she could not remember how many times Mr. Kovaleski abused her in the months that followed, the subsequent incidents involved him touching her inappropriately and masturbating but not performing intercourse.
"I stopped keeping track," she said during her testimony.
Mr. Kovaleski also represented parents in child-custody disputes as a court-appointed lawyer in Susquehanna County, authorities said.
The victim said she decided to report the abuse after Mr. Kovaleski threatened her and grabbed her throat when he learned that she had a relationship of a sexual nature with a boy her age.
The Times-Tribune does not identify the victims of sexual assault.
A formal arraignment in the case was scheduled for Oct. 12 at 9 a.m.
He remains free on $50,000 unsecured bail.
Contact the writer: domalley@timesshamrock.com, @domalleytt on Twitter
(via Instapaper)
Victor Cuvo, Attorney at Law
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