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A federal prosecutor in Salt Lake City said Monday her office will appeal a federal magistrate's decision releasing a Nevada man to a halfway house who is facing a possible mandatory 30-year prison sentence for sexual abuse of a child.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Paige Petersen asked U.S. Magistrate Evelyn Furse to stay her ruling pending the appeal to a U.S. district judge in the case of Mark Ward Oppenhein.

Furse declined and Petersen said she would file an appeal to Judge Ted Stewart before Oppenhein is scheduled for release on Wednesday.

The 51-year-old Oppenhein was arrested in July on four charges, three of them alleging sexual contact with a child under the age of 12 and the fourth alleging sexual contact without permission.

He faces a mandatory minimum prison sentence of 30 years if convicted on a charge of aggravated sexual abuse of a child within Indian country.

Oppenhein of Battle Mountain, Nev., is a member of the Te-Moak Tribe of the Western Shoshone. The alleged crimes took place on the Confederate Tribes of the Goshute Reservation, which is located along the border of Nevada and Utah.

Furse said that Oppenhein is presumed innocent of the charges before his trial and that federal law requires her to impose the least restrictive conditions on his release. While he poses a danger to the community, the risk is manageable with the restrictions and requirements placed on him, she ruled.

A halfway house in Salt Lake County would be far from his alleged victims and possible witnesses and Oppenhein will be required to wear a GPS monitoring device and must not have contact with minors without adult supervision and permission of court officers, Furse said.

Petersen had argued that Oppenhein has been molesting children for many years and other potential victims were recently discovered.

"The FBI has learned that additional women have come forward and said they were victims when they were younger," she said.

But Oppenhein's court-appointed attorney, Vanessa Ramos, said he has pleaded not guilty and is under a presumption of innocence unless convicted.

"The government is treating him like he's guilty," she said.

Oppenhein is scheduled to go to trial on April 20.