Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- The son of imprisoned polygamist Tom Green has pleaded guilty to reduced charges of misdemeanor sexual battery after he was accused of having sex with a 13-year-old girl whom he met on the Internet.
William John Aldrich Green, 19, entered the plea Thursday in 3rd District Court. Sentencing was set for July 10. Each count of sexual battery carries a penalty of up to a year in jail.
Green originally was charged with two counts of first-degree felony rape of a child.
Green, who was 18 at the time, met the girl on a social networking Internet site. He was accused of having sex with her in February and March 2006 in Draper. The girl reported him to police.
Green is represented by David Leavitt, who prosecuted the young man's father when Leavitt was the Juab County attorney.
Tom Green, 58, is one of Utah's best-known polygamists.
He was sentenced to prison in 2001 after being convicted of child rape for having sex when he was 37 with a 13-year-old girl who became his first wife. Green was also convicted of four counts of bigamy for having four other wives and with criminal non-support for the thousands of dollars in state child welfare payments made to support his 32 children.
He is scheduled for parole Aug. 7.
Leavitt said an evaluation of the younger Green indicated he was not a predator or a pedophile.
"He was an 18-year-old kid who made a very poor decision," Leavitt told The Salt Lake Tribune.
Leavitt said Green's family asked him to represent the young man, based on his prosecution of the father.
"I think the reality is that they felt I was competent, knew what I doing and had been fair and honest in long run," Leavitt said.
"There are lots of victims of polygamy, and of Tom Green, and Bill Green is one of them," he said.
------
Information from: The Salt Lake Tribune, http://www.sltrib.com
(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
