Provo River Trail beating victim wants lawsuit reinstated

Provo • The victim of a June 2010 vicious beating and alleged rape near the Provo River Trail is trying to revive her lawsuit against Utah County and its sheriff's office, as well as two companies allegedly affiliated with the county jail's work-release program, saying they failed to screen and supervise the inmate who perpetrated the crime.

The victim filed a lawsuit in 4th District Court against the agencies in February 2011, but a judge dismissed the case two years later.

On Thursday, the victim's attorney argued before the Utah Supreme Court, asking it to overrule existing case law and allow the woman's lawsuit to continue.

"This decision is wrong," said attorney Scott Bell. "It should be reversed."

The arguments Thursday — which were held at Brigham Young University as part of an outreach effort to allow students and the public to watch the court process — focused on a 1991 case, Rollins v. Peterson. In that case, the Utah Supreme Court ruled that plaintiffs must show that a custodian of a prisoner has liability to third parties only if they know that an inmate is dangerous to a particular group of persons.

Fourth District Judge David Mortensen, who dismissed the original lawsuit, had ruled that the victim had not asserted herself as an "identifiable" person as defined by law, instead claiming to belong to a subgroup of "young women." That subgroup was too large to be considered an identifiable group, the district judge wrote in his dismissal ruling.

On Thursday, Bell asked for this standard to be overruled, arguing that liability should not hinge on the relationship between the attacker and the victim. He was peppered with questions from the justices about who would be considered a custodian, what is a custodian's duty and whether all inmates pose some sort of risk to the public.

Attorney Peter Stirba, who represents Utah County and the sheriff's office, argued Thursday that there was no evidence that the attacker, Shawn Michael Leonard, was "uniquely dangerous" compared to other inmates.

At the time of the attack, Leonard was serving jail time for retail theft and drug possession. He had multiple felony convictions dating back to 1998, but they mostly concerned non-violent crimes, such as theft, criminal mischief and burglary, according to a search of Utah court records.

"We want to rehabilitate prisoners," Stirba said. "We don't want recidivism. There is a risk to that."

After about an hour of arguments and questioning, the justices took the matter under advisement. They will issue a written opinion at a later date.

Leonard pleaded guilty in April 2011 to two counts of aggravated kidnapping, aggravated robbery and attempted aggravated murder, all first-degree felonies. As part of a plea agreement, a charge of aggravated sexual assault was dropped.

Leonard, now 38, was sentenced in July 2011 to life in prison without the possibility of parole for attacking the then-19-year-old woman. The Salt Lake Tribune has chosen not to name the woman because she was allegedly the victim of a sexual assault.

Prior to the June 2010 attack, Leonard was found eligible for work-release privileges by county jail personnel and was placed by Intermountain Staffing to work at a Lindon manufacturing company called Universal Industrial Sales, Inc., according to the original complaint.

The lawsuit alleges that if Leonard had been properly screened by the defendants, he would have not been eligible for work-release because of his "extensive criminal history."

On June 8, 2010, Leonard "escaped and/or fled from Universal Industrial Sales Inc.," and the director of the work-release program "failed to timely inform the authorities of his escape," the lawsuit states.

The next day, the victim was writing in a notebook near the Provo River when Leonard approached and asked her for money, according to her testimony during Leonard's preliminary hearing.

When the victim said she had no money, Leonard demanded she get on the ground. The woman testified that Leonard then tied a string around her neck and choked her until she lost consciousness.

Prosecutors said Leonard at some point bashed the woman's face with a cinder block. She awoke to find her pants and underwear below her knees and her bra pulled up, according to preliminary hearing testimony.

A passerby found the woman huddled near the trail, holding her knees, with her face covered in blood.

Doctors discovered the woman's assailant had smashed out eight of her teeth, fractured her jaw, broken her right cheekbone and nearly blinded her in the right eye.

Police linked Leonard to the crime, in part, because his jail-issued ankle bracelet was found near the crime scene. Also, DNA from the beating victim was found on a shoelace that Leonard used on the same day to tie up another woman at a Provo shopping center so he could steal her car. Also found on the shoelace was DNA that came from Leonard, or one of his paternal relatives, according to preliminary hearing testimony. Prosecutors said the DNA evidence tied Leonard to both crimes.

The woman, who was seeking an unspecified amount of money in her lawsuit, spent two weeks in the hospital — followed by numerous surgeries to reconstruct her face, which included the use of metal plates — and months of recovery at home.

jmiller@sltrib.com

Twitter: @jm_miller