OXNARD : Man Convicted in Sex Assault on Cellmate

An Oxnard man already facing a prison sentence of 25 years to life for stealing cologne was convicted Monday of trying to sodomize his cellmate--a verdict that could bring an additional mandatory life sentence under the tough three-strikes law.

Roosevelt Carlton McCowan, 52, shook his head as a clerk read the verdict in Ventura County Superior Court.

“You can’t get no justice in this county,” he muttered.

After deliberating less than a day, a jury convicted McCowan of two felonies: attempted forcible sodomy and attempted sodomy in a detention facility.

Acting Superior Court Judge Roland E. Purnell scheduled an April 28 sentencing for McCowan on the sodomy convictions.

McCowan is also set to be sentenced Friday for the crime that first landed him in Ventura County Jail in March, 1993: stealing 18 bottles of cologne from an Oxnard store.

Two days after the cologne conviction, McCowan’s 31-year-old cellmate told guards that McCowan had tried to rape him.

The man, who has since sued the jail over the incident, had been serving a short term for petty theft at the time of the incident.

McCowan faces separate sentences of 25 years to life on each case under the three-strikes law enacted last year to take repeat offenders off the streets, Deputy Dist. Atty. Tom Connors said.

He said McCowan has seven prior felony convictions.

“This is the type of person that this legislation was enacted for,” Connors said.

“This guy cannot conform himself to society’s rules. He does his own thing, and he will continue to do his own thing until he dies.”

Defense attorney James M. Farley cited testimony from a second inmate who claimed McCowan had sodomized him, as the reason behind Monday’s jury verdict.