Editor’s note: This article contains descriptions of sexual violence. The National Sexual Assault Hotline can be reached 1-800-656-4673 and a list of local resources is available here.
A Milwaukee County judge has decided a 17-year-old boy accused of raping a 53-year-old woman will be tried as an adult.
It’s the third time the teen has faced sexual assault charges. Prosecutors say he followed the woman into her Milwaukee apartment building last December, trapped her in an elevator and stomped on her bandaged leg before raping her.
“Keeping you in juvenile court and sending you back to Lincoln Hills and expecting a different result is unfortunately the definition of insanity,” Circuit Court Judge Ronnie V. Murray II said during a hearing on April 17.
After his decision, the victim in the case read a prepared statement in court, supporting the move to adult court and saying the teen was a danger to the public.
“Had the justice system actually done the right thing, I most likely would not be sitting here today,” said Charlotte Nozar, who gave the Journal Sentinel permission to publish her name. The news organization does not name victims of sexual assault without their consent.
The teen’s public defender, Paul Rifelj, said the boy could be better served in the juvenile justice system and belonged there because of his age. He declined to comment after the hearing.
The Journal Sentinel is not naming the teen because of state laws governing confidential information in the juvenile court system. Although the teen was ordered into the adult system, a criminal complaint has not yet been filed against him.
At the time of the alleged sexual assault, the teen was 16 and had been on GPS monitoring for a prior offense. In Wisconsin, everyone age 17 and older is automatically charged as an adult for any offense.
If convicted of second-degree sexual assault in adult court, the teen could face a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison and 15 years of extended supervision. The judge set the teen’s bail at $50,000.
Nozar said she felt relief after the judge’s decision and feels compelled to seek justice for herself and prior victims.
“There’s so much ugliness and brokenness in the world today,” she said in an interview. “Until we start taking care of each other, looking out for each other, it’s going to continue and get worse.”
“You just have to stand up and say ‘No, enough,'” she added.
Nozar’s job as a traveling nurse brought her to Wisconsin more than a year ago. She had a 30-year career in nursing, providing care in correctional facilities for 17 years.
She said after she was attacked in December, she did not feel safe at her apartment, moved out and has been staying with friends. Her injuries prevented her from working and driving. She has undergone several medical procedures and has sought mental health treatment, too.
“It took my ability to take care of myself,” she said.
She wants to go home to Ohio, where her daughter and grandchildren live, and train to become a sexual assault nurse examiner, a medical professional who cares for rape survivors and collects forensic evidence.
But for now, she feels stuck.
“I will live with this for the rest of my life,” she said.
Teen arrested in earlier rape of 75-year-old woman after leading police on a chase in her stolen car
Much of the hearing focused on the teen’s past conduct and prior attempts to reform.
As a 12-year-old, he was adjudicated delinquent, or found guilty, of two counts of fourth-degree sexual assault for chasing and groping two women in November 2020. He also pepper-sprayed one of them. The Journal Sentinel sought the juvenile petition in the case, but a judge denied the records request.
The boy was placed on probation and attended three sex offender treatment sessions by August 2021, according to the current juvenile petition filed against him.
Two months later, he was accused of raping an elderly woman during a home invasion.
A judge did allow the Journal Sentinel to review the juvenile petition in that case. The document offered more information about what occurred — including that the teen had led police on a high-speed chase.
According to court records:
A 75-year-old woman told police she had found her parked car ransacked on the morning of Oct. 13, 2021. As she checked on her car, she noticed a boy walking by and made eye contact.
That afternoon, she walked into her dining room and was startled to find the same boy inside her house.
She screamed at him to get out. The teen calmly said he needed to use the bathroom. He briefly left the room and returned with a knife. He pushed the woman to the ground and raped her.
The woman broke free, sat on the ground, and said: “Just stop. Let’s sit here. Let’s talk.”
The teen told her he had hidden in her bathroom shower earlier that day and that he wanted money. He drove her to an ATM where he withdrew $500 from the woman’s account.
Eventually, he parked in an alley and the woman was able to open the door and flee. The teen drove off in the woman’s car and was arrested later that day after leading police on a chase for nearly a mile. The pursuit ended when the teen crashed into an apartment building on Wells Street.
On Feb. 4, 2022, he was found delinquent of first-degree sexual assault and burglary.
The teen was sent to Lincoln Hills School for Boys, a youth prison operated by the state Department of Corrections. He was released in less than a year after completing sex offender treatment and therapy.
His court orders on both earlier cases were extended through Feb. 4, 2024, for more programming in the community including therapy sessions.
But on Jan. 20, 2024, he was found in a car with stolen packages from an apartment building while armed with a semiautomatic pistol he had stolen. Following the incident, he was again adjudicated delinquent and placed in Lincoln Hills School for one year.
He was released early last August after he again “did well” at Lincoln Hills, completing educational and behavioral therapy programs, the document states.
An authorized GoFundMe has been set up to benefit Charlotte Nozar to assist in her medical and housing expenses.
Ashley Luthern is a reporter and deputy investigations editor at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. She can be reached at ashley.luthern@jrn.com.
David Clarey is a public safety reporter at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. He can be reached at dclarey@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Milwaukee teen charged in rape of elderly woman to be tried as adult