W.V. teen charged in assault on girl

Disturbing details about the kidnapping and assault of a 6-year-old girl found bleeding and unconscious on a West Valley driveway were released Monday in court documents.

A 17-year-old boy who was originally called a hero after allegedly finding the girl was charged in 3rd District Juvenile Court with aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping, two counts of sodomy upon a child with injury and aggravated sex abuse on a child. All charges are first-degree felonies, except the aggravated assault, which is a second-degree felony.

On Sept. 11, the 6-year-old victim walked from her house to her friend's house, about half a block away, in the neighborhood of 3800 South and 7120 West. When she got to the house, the teen, who had been mowing his lawn, told her that her friend was in his backyard, according to court documents.

When the girl walked into his backyard, the teen "pushed her to the ground and choked her because he 'wanted her to sleep or something,' " the documents state.

The young girl fought back, scratching the boy's face and neck. But he continued to "choke her until she was unconscious," court documents state. Prosecutors say the boy then sexually assaulted her.

After he was done, the boy "threw" the girl over the backyard fence. He later told police he did not think she was breathing when he did that, according to court documents.

After dumping the girl, the boy called for help, getting the attention of his sister and a neighbor, saying he had just found the girl, documents say. The neighbor made several attempts to wake the young girl before being successful. He found blood in her hair and a tooth was missing.

When police arrived, an officer noticed brown spots on the boy's shirt and "red bloody scratch marks" on the right side of his mouth in a downward direction toward his neck, according to police. The boy said the injuries were from falling off a bus a couple of days earlier and the brown spots were food stains.

Forensics tests, however, revealed one of the stains was blood.

After the teen was arrested and while he was being processed into juvenile detention, he said, "Tell the little girl I am sorry for what I did to her," according to court documents. After that, he requested another interview with a West Valley police detective, saying he "wanted to get it off his chest."

The boy had a detention review and pretrial hearing Monday in juvenile court. His next scheduled court appearance is Sept. 29.

It was unknown Monday whether the 17-year-old would be bound over to adult court to stand trial. There are several criteria that must be met to charge a juvenile as an adult. "Any 16- or 17-year-old juvenile charged with one of 10 designated felonies against a person is charged by criminal information. The juvenile court then conducts a certification hearing. If the state shows probable cause that the offense was committed, the juvenile is then bound over to district court unless the juvenile convinces the juvenile court judge in a certification hearing that there are compelling reasons to keep the case in juvenile court," the Media Guide to the Utah State Courts states.

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