Man Pleads Guilty to 1 Charge of Rape

The Ventura County district attorney’s office agreed Wednesday to drop two of three charges against an Oxnard rape suspect and recommend the minimum prison sentence for him.

Prosecutors said they made the deal because, during an October trial, the victim recanted her allegation. The jury deadlocked on the three criminal counts.

“This was a very rare exception that we have never done” in a rape case, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Lela M. Henke-Dobroth, who has prosecuted sexual-assault cases in the county for eight years.

The defendant, Dale Chester, 22, entered a plea of guilty to one count of rape and is expected to receive a three-year prison term when he is sentenced Dec. 23.

Chester had faced up to 39 years in prison on two counts of rape and one count of oral copulation.

The plea bargain stemmed from a July rape of a 20-year-old woman in a Camarillo park and ended with both sides doing everything in their power to avoid a second trial, which was scheduled to start Wednesday.

A jury had been selected on Tuesday.

But Henke-Dobroth said prosecutors were mindful of how the first jury in the case failed to reach a decision on the three charges after hearing the victim recant. That jury also acquitted Chester of a fourth charge--attempted sodomy on the woman.

Speaking to reporters outside the courtroom, Henke-Dobroth appeared somewhat dejected and said, “Merry Christmas, Mr. Chester.”

Deputy Public Defender Robert K. Willey said he advised his client to take the deal because he can be free in about 13 months if he is a good prisoner and because of time already served in County Jail since his July 3 arrest.

“Jury trials are always risky propositions,” said Willey. “The last jury hung up. This one may well have hung up.”

But, he said, he did not think it was in Chester’s best interest to take that chance.

Chester, though, could be overheard in a courtroom holding cell lamenting the plea bargain before deciding to accept it. He was granted a request to visit with his parents, who were summoned to the Hall of Justice.

After that meeting, Chester sat calmly at the defense table as Judge Lawrence Storch asked him to enter his plea to the first count of rape.

“Guilty,” he said somberly, shaking his head in apparent disgust.

Willey later explained his client’s reluctance.

“It’s a very difficult decision to make a plea of guilty in a case where there is some significant evidence that he is not guilty,” the defense attorney said outside the courtroom.

The rape occurred about 3:30 a.m. in Pleasant Valley Park. The victim initially told sheriff’s deputies she went with Chester to the park because he promised to take her to see his brother Ruben, whom she was dating.

At first, she reported the rape to a couple who live across the street from the park. In a tape-recorded call she made to 911 emergency operators moments later, the woman repeated the rape allegation and warned that Chester had a gun.

Deputies arrested Chester a short distance away from the park and found his underwear and a .357 magnum close by.

But the woman recanted three days later. She also recanted on the witness stand Oct. 13 during Chester’s first trial and said she intended to recant again if Chester was retried.

Henke-Dobroth said the woman had received “threats and pressure” not to testify.

The woman appeared at the courthouse Wednesday, but left quickly after Chester’s plea without talking to authorities.

Defense attorney Willey said he believes prosecutors tried the case against Chester because the defendant has two other brothers who are serving prison terms in separate sexual-assault cases.

He emphasized, however, that he was not claiming the prosecution acted improperly.

“A large part of the decision to prosecute was because of the brothers,” Willey said.

Henke-Dobroth, who supervises the district attorney’s sexual-assault unit, denied the allegation.

“I’m appalled that anyone within our criminal justice system would truly believe that we would prosecute someone because a relative was in prison for a similar crime,” she said. “Dale Chester was prosecuted because he raped a woman, and he pleaded guilty to it.”