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DUCHESNE — A member of the Tabiona Town Council accused of sending sexually explicit messages to a teen girl has been ordered to stand trial.
Meanwhile, his wife has entered a no-contest plea to reckless endangerment for leaving the couple's young children home alone while she went shopping.
Jason Dan Hoyt and Ashley Winona Hoyt each appeared Monday in 8th District Court in cases that Duchesne County investigators say are strangely connected.
During a preliminary hearing, a 14-year-old girl testified that Jason Hoyt, 25, began to send her sexually explicit Facebook messages shortly after she accepted his "friend request" in December.
The girl testified that she provided investigators with screenshots of the town councilman's messages. In those messages, Jason Hoyt allegedly asked the girl if she was sexually active, if she had ever engaged in a specific sex act and if she would go for a ride alone with him on Tabby Mountain.
"He also said that he thought she was 17 years old, not 14," Duchesne County Sheriff's Lt. Dela Rowley said Monday while testifying about an interview with Hoyt.
Ashley Hoyt's 'no-contest' plea
That interview happened after Hoyt returned home from work on Jan. 5 while investigators were executing a search warrant at his home. Detectives said when they initially arrived at the home with the warrant, the Hoyts' 5-year-old daughter answered the door.
The girl told investigators she was home alone with her 1-year-old and 2-year-old siblings, and that their mother had gone shopping. When detectives finally reached Ashley Hoyt by telephone, she was 50 miles away in Roosevelt, authorities said.
"It was just a freak thing that we happened to serve the warrant that day," Rowley said.
Defense attorney Walter Bugden said Monday that Ashley Hoyt, 27, left the children with the expectation that her husband would be home from work soon to care for them.
Ashley Hoyt's no-contest plea to reckless endangerment, a class A misdemeanor, will be held in abeyance and then dismissed if she pays $100 to the court and violates no other laws in the next six months, according to terms of her plea agreement.
Jason Hoyt's preliminary hearing
Bugden, who also represents Jason Hoyt, argued during his preliminary hearing he may have discussed sex in the Facebook messages, but he never asked the teenage girl to engage in any sexual activity. All Jason Hoyt asked the girl was what she would do if he kissed her, Bugden said.
"There isn't a statute, your honor, that prohibits someone who is 25 from asking someone who is 14, 'What would happen if I tried to kiss you?'" Bugden said. "It may be creepy. It may be offensive. It may be something that seems wrong … but kissing has not been prohibited by our Legislature."
Duchesne County prosecutor Grant Charles, however, argued that Jason Hoyt's alleged conduct — when viewed as a whole and in context — showed that he was trying to get the teen girl to engage in sexual activity with him.
After listening to the testimony and arguments, Judge Samuel Chiara ruled that there was sufficient probable cause to bind Jason Hoyt over for trial on the enticing charge. He set an arraignment hearing for March 16.
Jason Hoyt is free on bail. He still holds his seat on the Tabiona Town Council.
Duchesne County investigators initially placed they Hoyts' children with family members after finding the kids home alone in January. The children are back with their parents, but the state Division of Child and Family Services was contacted, according to the sheriff's office.
