Convicted child-sex offender eligible for parole in January

STAFF report

WARREN — It’s possible that a videotape showing Martin Petersime engaging in lewd conduct after paying a 15-year-old boy to do something similar in the basement of the Warren Music Store in 1992 will be all the Ohio Parole Board needs to determine that Petersime needs to remain in prison.

But in case that’s not enough, Dennis Watkins, Trumbull County prosecutor, has submitted a letter and other materials to the agency. In the letter, Watkins pointed to a 1999 court-ordered evaluation that said Petersime “poses a high risk to the community and may be likely to engage in the future in a sexually oriented offense against a child.”

Petersime, 56, owner of the former store on High Street just east of Courthouse Square, was convicted of rape and other offenses in 1992 and has served 17 years of a possible 40-year prison sentence. Petersime is eligible for parole in January.

The tape Watkins forwarded to the parole board was filmed April 28, 1992, when the 15-year-old had gone to the store after hours and was asked to make a porno movie for $15.

After Petersime taped the boy, Petersime asked the boy to tape him in a similar way, which the boy did.

Petersime left the basement momentarily, and the boy grabbed some clothes, took the videotape out of the camera and ran to the Warren Police Department a couple of blocks away.

Police found 30 homemade videotapes at Petersime’s residence and documented crimes against six children. Some of the victims were music students at his business, and others were young people who worked there cleaning up and doing odd jobs, Watkins said. Petersime pleaded guilty to 20 felony charges.

Petersime also was convicted in Piqua, Ohio, in 1975, of contributing to the delinquency of a minor and in Cleveland in 1976 of exhibiting materials harmful to a juvenile.

Petersime gave drugs to children to facilitate sex with them, had group sex with them, produced pornographic films with them and himself and many other types of sexual deviancy, Watkins said.

“He is truly a pervert’s pervert,” Watkins wrote. “Under my calculation, he has 23 more years to serve to fulfill the 40-year sentence he certainly has earned and deserved.”

At 40 years, Petersime would be released in 2032, when he is nearly 80 years old.