Published: August 27, 2009 11:40 pm      

Appeal bond denied

Former Elliott jailer will remain behind bars

CATLETTSBURG — For the time being, at least, former Elliott County Jailer Charles Howard will have to wait behind bars for his appeal to make its way through the legal system.

Howard’s attorney, Michael Curtis, filed a motion earlier this month in Boyd Circuit Court for his client to be released on bond pending appeal of his rape conviction and 12-year prison sentence.

On Thursday, Judge George W. Davis III denied that motion.

Curtis filed a notice of appeal in the case last month and filed the motion for the appeal bond with the trial court on Aug. 6, according to records.

Releasing Howard on bail pending appeal “would impermissibly constitute a flight risk by the defendant and would pose a continuing danger and threat to the community,” Davis wrote in his order denying Curtis’ motion.

Curtis still has the option of requesting that the Kentucky Court of Appeals set a bond for his client pending its review of his case. He said Thursday that he intended to just that.

A jury on June 29 found Howard, 51, of Sandy Hook, guilty of raping a 27-year-old Boyd County woman while transporting her from Sandy Hook to the Boyd County Detention Center. The woman had been arrested in Elliott County on some outstanding misdemeanor warrants.

The victim testified that Howard drove her to an isolated spot off U.S. 60 in the Rush area and made her have sex with him. She said Howard held her down in the front seat of his vehicle as he was raping her.

Whether Howard had sex with the woman was never in doubt. Howard admitted he had done so, and DNA tests proved it. However, Howard maintained the sex was consensual and that the woman initiated it.

Under state sentencing guidelines, Howard will have to serve 85 percent of his sentence before he can be considered for parole. He also will have to complete a sex offender treatment program in prison before he can begin earning time that will count toward his parole eligibility.

Howard is in the Greenup County Detention Center, according to the Kentucky Online Offender Lookup System.

Howard, who was in his second term as jailer, resigned his position a month after being convicted. To replace him, Elliott Judge-Executive David Blair appointed Mark E. Lewis, who placed second behind Howard in the 2006 Democratic primary, and who was designated by the fiscal court to transport prisoners after Howard was arrested in September of last year.

Lewis will serve the remainder of Howard’s term, which expires at the end of 2010.

Elliott County has not operated its own jail since 1986, when the state ordered the county to close its lockup. All prisoners from Elliott are transported to jails in other counties to be held, and Elliott pays fees to those counties for housing its inmates.