Former Boyceville man facing 29 felonies for child assault and possession of child pornography
By LeAnn R. Ralph
MENOMONIE — A 39-year-old former Boyceville resident is facing 29 felony charges related to sex crimes against young children, including 16 new child pornography charges.
Ted Lopez appeared in Dunn County Circuit Court May 22, along with his attorney Charles Huff, before Judge Rod Smeltzer and pleaded not guilty on two separate cases, one that includes 23 felonies and the other that includes two felonies.
In two separate cases, Lopez is charged with two Class B felonies of the repeated sexual assault of a child. A Class B felony carries a penalty of 60 years in prison.
The criminal complaint notes that Wisconsin Statute 939.616 (1r) and (3) is invoked for at least one of the Class B felonies, which means if Lopez is convicted, he will serve at least 25 years in prison.
Dunn County District Attorney Andrea Nodolf also is invoking that portion of state law for most of the other felonies in the case with the 17 counts of child pornography so that if convicted, Lopez would spend at least three years in prison on each of the counts of child pornography.
For the Class C felony, if convicted, Lopez would spend at least five years in prison.
Lopez also is charged with felony counts of child enticement with sexual contact, exposing a child to harmful material, causing mental harm to a child, child exploitation involving videos and photographs, in addition to the 17 counts of child pornography.
Nodolf filed an amended complaint with the court that added 16 new felony counts for the possession of child pornography.
The additional counts for the possession of child pornography were associated with a Menomonie police department case and were “transactionally” related to the case that charged Lopez with the repeated sexual assault of a child, causing mental harm to a child, sexual exploitation of a child, causing a child less than 13 years of age to view or listen to sexual activity, child enticement, exposing a child to harmful material and one count of possessing child pornography.
Huff, Lopez’s attorney, said he had no problem with amending the criminal complaint to include the child pornography counts and agreed that the new counts were transactionally related to the previous counts.
Judge Smeltzer asked for clarification that Lopez was pleading not guilty to all 23 counts in the amended complaint, and Huff affirmed that Lopez was pleading not guilty.
Repeat offender
Lopez was convicted of felony possession of marijuana in September of 2014, and Nodolf is invoking a section of state statute that would increase the prison time for Lopez, if convicted, by up to six years on all but one of the felonies because he is a repeat offender.
On one of the felonies, a Class I, Lopez would face an increased penalty of up to four years in prison.
Nodolf also is seeking to place Lopez, if convicted, on lifetime supervision for a serious sex offender.
According to the criminal complaint in the second of the two cases involving young boys, between January 1, 2010, and December 31, 2014, Lopez allegedly committed repeated sexual assault involving the same child, Victim #2, in the Village of Boyceville.
The alleged victim was nine years old at the time of the last sexual assault.
On August 30, 2016, while executing a search warrant at Lopez’s home in Menomonie, a computer was seized. In addition to a number of documents that identified Lopez as the owner of the computer, the hard-drive also contained 3,000 images of child pornography, according to the complaint.
Interview
During a forensic interview at the Chippewa Valley child Advocacy Center in Eau Claire, the boy said he was five or six years old when Lopez showed him pornography on a tablet computer.
The boy described a variety of inappropriate sexual contact that allegedly occurred, including anal and oral intercourse.
The alleged victim also said Lopez was smoking pot or cocaine at one point, and when asked how he knew what he was, he said it “smelled weird” and that he “got a little buzz off of it.”
When asked if anyone else had ever joined them, the alleged victim said Lopez’s girlfriend had participated in the sexual activity. When asked if another person had ever participated in the sexual activity, the boy “was slow to answer no other than the defendant’s girlfriend,” according to the complaint.
The images of child pornography described in the complaint involve young girls between the ages of eight and ten, young girls between the ages of 12 and 14, and several images involving girls that appear to be between six and eight years old.
The investigator from the Menomonie police department indicated she had recognized one of the images from a previous case, and the two children in the image were identified as children from Italy.
Bail
During the May 22 court hearing, Judge Smeltzer added a $5,000 cash bail to the $50,000 cash bail set in a previous case.
In the first of the Dunn County cases, bail was set at $50,000 in October of 2016. Lopez posted the cash bail on January 11.
Lopez remained in custody at the time of the May 22 court hearing.
Huff requested that Judge Smeltzer amend the conditions of the bail from no contact with minors to allow Lopez to have supervised contact with his daughter.
Nodolf objected to modifying the conditions of bail and said the sexual assaults involved both male and female minors.
Judge Smeltzer said he would not grant Lopez contact with his daughter and that conditions of bail remained to have no contact with minors, including Lopez’s daughter.
Lopez also is ordered to have no electronic devices, except if the electronic device involves direct communication with his attorney.
Another court hearing is scheduled for Lopez in Dunn County July 17 at 10:30 a.m.
