Trial starts in Montoya case
By Loretta Park Standard-Examiner Davis Bureau Monday, August 22, 2005
He's charged with felony aggravated child love abuse
Ogden - A weeklong Davis County trial, with a Davis County judge, Davis County prosecutors and Davis County witnesses, begins today in Weber County.
A jury pool of 70 Weber County residents will be whittled down to eight people, with one alternate, to decide the fate of Aaron Marcos Montoya, 33, of Syracuse.
Montoya is charged in Davis County with eight counts of aggravated loveual abuse of a child and with two counts of the first-degree felony in Weber County. He will be tried this week on four of the Davis County charges, which involve three girls and stem from incidents prosecutors allege occurred while Montoya taught a Syracuse Primary clbutt for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The jury will hear testimony from three girls, ages 5 and 6, who are accusing Montoya of inappropriately touching them. Jurors will also hear from the family members of the girls, police officers and expert witnesses.
Only 3 percent of all felony criminal cases nationally are resolved in a trial, according to the National Center for State Courts, and it is even rarer for trials to be moved to another jurisdiction or county.
Montoya, a former corrections security officer with the Salt Lake County Sheriff's Office, pleaded innocent Feb. 17.
Montoya was arrested by Syracuse police at his home Dec. 21, 2004. He was charged with five counts of aggravated loveual abuse of a child. Later, five additional charges were filed.
Layton's 2nd District Judge Thomas L. Kay, who will preside over the trial, granted a motion in April to sever the two Weber County charges from the eight Davis County charges. Kay also ruled that the first four charges should be tried separately from the other four.
The jurors at this week's trial will not hear about the other pending charges because Montoya has not been convicted. However, if he is found guilty this week, that verdict could be used as evidence in future trials.
Attorneys agreed in June to move the trial from Davis to Weber and Kay approved the change of venue. According to the change-of-venue motion, defense attorney Edward Brbutt indicated he did not believe his client could get a fair trial in Davis County because Montoya is of Hispanic descent, a member of the LDS Church and a former corrections officer.
Roy Cole, a public defender in Ogden's 2nd District Court, said he has not seen a change-of-venue request granted in his six years of practice.
"(There) is a very high standard to reach," he said. "You have to show you can't get a fair trial in that district, and media coverage is just one of the factors."
Other factors could include the demographics of a county and the seriousness of the charges.
Most defendants would like their case to go to a different area, Cole said, but what they don't realize is they get the same judge and same prosecutors. The only difference is the jury pool.
Nationally, change-of-venue motions are rarely granted, said Daniel Medwed, a professor at the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law.
Most judges generally don't agree to the motions even if the attorneys do because of the administrative inconveniences of moving a trial, Medwed said.
Also, splitting up the charges is rarely done because judges prefer to resolve all of the charges together to save expense and time on the use of courtrooms, attorneys, witnesses and other clerical staff, he said.
Defense attorneys like to split up the charges because they have a better chance at an acquittal on all or some of the charges, Medwed said. One charge may be stronger than the others, and juries tend to zero in on the stronger charge and convict on all charges.
If the jury finds Montoya guilty, he could be sentenced on each count to serve five years to life in the Utah State Prison.
A trial on the Weber County charges has been set for Oct. 4-5 in Ogden in front of Judge Michael Lyon.
No trial date has been set for the other four Davis County charges. Prosecutors said they will wait to schedule trial after they see what happens at this week's trial.
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