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A Logan judge on Tuesday ordered that former Utah State University football star Torrey Green will stand trial on a final charge of aggravated kidnapping.
In April, 1st District Judge Brian Cannell ruled that there was probable cause for Green to go to trial on 11 felonies in connection with the testimony of seven women who say the athlete sexually assaulted them while he was a student at the Logan school.
But the judge did not at that time rule on one other charge — a count of first-degree felony aggravated kidnapping — and instead asked attorneys to file written briefs with further legal arguments.
Deputy Cache County Attorney Spencer Walsh had argued in court papers that Green "unlawfully detained" the alleged victim in his apartment in October 2014 and simulated sex with the woman over her clothes. The detainment, Walsh said, was done with the intent to "facilitate the commission of felony" — in this case, forcible sexual abuse.
But Green's attorney, Skye Lazaro, had argued that the state had not shown that the alleged victim was detained for "any substantial period of time."
Cannell ultimately ruled on Tuesday that Green will stand trial on the kidnapping charge, according to prosecutors.
Prosecutors have highlighted the similarities among many of the women's accounts: Most met Green on the dating app Tinder, the women testified, or on USU's campus. Most had agreed to watch a movie at Green's apartment, where he subsequently allegedly raped or sexually assaulted them. And most were allegedly assaulted the first time they were alone with Green.
Lazaro, meanwhile, has emphasized that many of the women could not recall some details of the alleged assaults, and that they did not scream or yell for help. Most did not immediately report to police, she argued in court, and many did not get a rape kit examination.
Lazaro also noted that in one case, prosecutors screened the case and initially declined to file charges. Several of the women publicly aired allegations in a Salt Lake Tribune story published last July, she told the judge, just after Green had signed a contract to play football in the NFL.
Each of the four women included in the July story had previously reported their alleged assaults to police. The Tribune's reporting prompted Cache County prosecutors to re-examine sexual-assault allegations lodged against Green in 2015. Other alleged victims have come forward, and since July, prosecutors have investigated at least 15 sexual-assault allegations against Green.
Attorneys will now focus on a doctrine of chances motion filed by prosecutors, which if granted, would allow them to present evidence and testimony from the seven alleged victims at each of the trials in the seven individual cases.
The doctrine of chances is a legal rule that allows evidence of other bad acts to be presented at a trial to show it is unlikely that a defendant would be innocently involved in similar situations repeatedly.
Cache County prosecutors say in court papers that they want to present that type of evidence so the jury can question the likelihood that seven different women — who don't know one another — would falsely accuse Green of rape. Attorneys are expected to argue the issue in court on Aug. 3.
Green, 23, is being held in the Cache County jail without the opportunity to post bail.