CONSTRUCTION WORKER CHARGED IN RAPE, APARTMENT BURGLARIES.Byline: Laurence Darmiento Daily News Staff Writer Criminal charges carrying more than 20 years in prison were filed Wednesday against a Canyon Country construction worker accused of rape and two burglaries with sexual overtones. Two days after consulting with his minister and turning himself in, Russel Wyat Pierce appeared in Newhall Municipal Court to face seven felonies in a series of crimes at a Sierra Highway Sierra Highway is a road in Southern California, United States. It runs from Tunnel Station near the north limit of the City of Los Angeles, where it intersects with San Fernando Road and Foothill Boulevard, as well as Interstate 5, and continues north to Mojave, mostly paralleling apartment complex. His attorney entered a plea of not guilty on his behalf, and a Feb. 22 preliminary hearing of the evidence was scheduled. He was ordered held on $300,000 bail. Pierce, 38, who was dressed in faded blue jeans blue jeans also blue·jeans pl.n. Clothes, especially pants, made of blue denim. blue jeans npl → tejanos mpl; vaqueros mpl , construction boots and a white T-shirt, did not speak. Upon entering the courtroom, however, he mouthed the words "I love you" to his wife and sat down. He then became teary-eyed and appeared to be praying to himself. Pierce, who had a prior burglary conviction, was charged with two counts of forcible forc·i·ble adj. 1. Effected against resistance through the use of force: The police used forcible restraint in order to subdue the assailant. 2. Characterized by force; powerful. rape and three other felonies in a Friday evening attack of a Canyon Country woman who lived in an apartment complex by his home. Detectives say Pierce broke into her apartment and attacked her while she slept. He also was charged with two counts of burglary for break-ins at two other complex apartments Sept. 14 and Jan. 17. "This is not date rape date rape n. forcible sexual intercourse by a male acquaintance of a woman, during a voluntary social engagement in which the woman did not intend to submit to the sexual advances and resisted the acts by verbal refusals, denials or pleas to stop, and/or physical . This is something very different, predatory in nature," said Deputy District Attorney Dan Damon, chief of the district attorney's Newhall office. "The rape was a very serious, violent sexual assault." Deputy Public Defender public defender, governmental official who represents indigent persons accused of crime. U.S. Supreme Court decisions expanding the right to counsel to pretrial proceedings and holding that a person cannot be sentenced to even one day in jail unless a lawyer was David Hizami, who represented Pierce during the arraignment A criminal proceeding at which the defendant is officially called before a court of competent jurisdiction, informed of the offense charged in the complaint, information, indictment, or other charging document, and asked to enter a plea of guilty, not guilty, or as otherwise permitted , declined all comment. Pierce's wife also declined to talk. Pierce turned himself in at the Santa Clarita Valley The Santa Clarita Valley is the valley of the Santa Clara River in Southern California. It stretches through Los Angeles County and Ventura County. Its main population center is the city of Santa Clarita. The valley was part of the 48,612-acre (19,672. sheriff's station Monday night after learning that he was being sought by deputies in the Jan. 17 burglary. Deputies say his minister convinced him to do so. During that burglary credit cards were stolen, and later used to make purchases over the telephone. Those calls were traced back Monday to Pierce's home and a San Fernando Valley San Fernando Valley Valley, southern California, U.S. Northwest of central Los Angeles, the valley is bounded by the San Gabriel, Santa Susana, and Santa Monica mountains and the Simi Hills. construction site where he worked, deputies said. Pierce, who has two children ages 11 years and 8 months, was convicted in 1989 of a burglary that deputies say also had sexual overtones. The prior burglary counts as a "strike" under the states "three strikes" law. Pierce consequently faces double the regular prison sentence if convicted of the new charges, Damon said. He also must serve at least 85 percent of the time. |
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