Woman testifies in sexual battery case

State law prohibits people in authority from having sex with those they are supervising.
By ED RUNYAN
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
WARREN -- A female resident of the Northeast Ohio Community Alternative Program had sex in a restroom with a male resident superviser, and admitted the affair later when people throughout the facility began talking about it, according to testimony.
Damon Vaughn, 36, of Kenilworth Avenue, is on trial in the Trumbull County Common Pleas courtroom of Judge John Stuard, who is hearing the case without a jury. Vaughn is charged with four counts of sexual battery.
The woman, of Willoughby, testified Monday. She was sentenced to the facility early in 2004 from Lake County Common Pleas Court on a conviction of receiving stolen property.
The charges stem from allegations that the woman and Vaughn had consensual sex in a restroom at the facility in April or May of 2004. If convicted, Vaughn faces from one to five years in prison on each count.
About the facility
The facility on Pine Avenue Southeast houses felony offenders who qualify for probation, said Anthony Noday, its business director. NEOCAP serves both male and female nonviolent offenders and has 125 beds. It opened in 1997.
The facility has a staff of 58 full-time and 11 part-time employees. It provides common pleas judges with an alternative to prison or parole for nonviolent offenders.
The woman testified she had sex with Vaughn in a staff restroom on two occasions. She testified Vaughn initiated the first encounter by nodding in the direction of the restroom, down a hallway from a smoking area. She walked to the doorway and waited there until he arrived and let them into the room with his key, she said.
The second encounter there occurred a couple weeks later, she said. Vaughn worked an afternoon shift, and the encounters took place toward the end of the shifts, when it was nearly bedtime for the residents, the woman said.
Word spread throughout the facility about the encounters, the woman testified, which made it difficult for her to remain there. "I was already emotional, and the [female residents] were calling me a whore and a slut, and before long all the staff became aware of it," she said.
Though the woman denied the encounters at first, fearing she and Vaughn would get into trouble, she later gave a sworn statement to Warren police. Vaughn was fired in May 2004. He was hired in August 2002.
State law
According to state law, a person in authority, such as a jail guard or teacher, is prohibited from having sexual relations with a person he or she is supervising, said Chuck Morrow, an assistant Trumbull County prosecutor on the case.
Noday testified that Vaughn normally supervised the male wing of the facility but was allowed to move freely between the male and female sections. Generally the facility was staffed by four or more resident supervisers at a time, one in the female section, the rest in the male section.
Resident supervisers are essentially guards, Noday said, though part of their job is to interact with the residents.
Residents are sentenced to the facility for up to six months at a time. While there they are given assessments and classes in drug and alcohol rehabilitation, stress management and assistance in finding jobs and housing. Though residents are sometimes allowed to leave the facility during the day, they are locked down at night and are not allowed to interact with residents of the opposite sex, Noday said.
runyan@vindy.com