Victim Has Say in Rapist Sentence--He Goes Directly to Jail

A woman who was allowed to decide her rapist’s fate chose a plea-bargained 4 1/2-year sentence that will put him behind bars immediately, then said of being asked to choose: “Wasn’t that something?”

“He was so kind,” the 65-year-old victim said of Hennepin County Judge William Posten. “He said, ‘It’s your decision.’ I liked that.”

Posten called the victim into his chambers Monday and gave her two choices in the prosecution of James Halvorson, 25. She could have the case go to trial and hope for a conviction, which could have meant a 9-year prison term, or she could accept a plea agreement providing for a 4 1/2-year sentence.

The woman chose immediate incarceration in lieu of a trial because Halvorson was free on bond and she feared being attacked again, Assistant County Atty. Kevin Johnson said.

Halvorson was accused of breaking into the woman’s house through a kitchen window in the early morning hours of June 16. The noise awoke the woman and she went to investigate.

A man dragged her from the kitchen to the bedroom, covered her head with a blanket and raped her. He fell asleep after the attack and the woman ran to a neighbor’s house to telephone police, Johnson said.

Halvorson’s attorney, Earl Gray, said Halvorson was “drunk out of his mind” at the time. He had recently been convicted of drunk driving for a fourth time and had received a delayed jail sentence two days before the rape.

The woman, haunted by the thought of a second attack, moved in with other family members and put her home of 30 years on sale, said Cindy Clarkson, a sexual assault counselor.

“She was feeling pretty powerless,” Clarkson said. “What the judge did was wonderful.”