Past abuse acknowledged in molestation case

If 79-year-old Roger Alan Scherner took the stand Wednesday to testify in his own defense in his trial for the alleged sexual abuse of a 7-year-old relative in Bellevue, it was difficult to tell.

Scherner is charged with three counts of molesting one girl but is accused by at least nine women of doing the same to them over the course of four decades. In remarkable testimony Wednesday, he admitted to molesting another young relative, hinted that he may have abused others and said he couldn't recall what happened during three middle-of-the-night encounters with the 7-year-old during a family vacation.

During questioning by his defense attorney, Scherner — who was the defense's only witness — explained that he fled to Florida in February before his King County trial was set to begin in part because he "felt the previous adventures with women I had would come up ... and I would not have a fair trial."

"Is that what you call the fact that you've molested children over the years, 'adventures with women'?" asked Senior Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Julie Kays during cross-examination.

"That's the only term that came to mind," said Scherner.

After his testimony, Scherner's defense attorneys chose not to requestion him and rested their case.

Because of a new state law at the heart of the case, evidence of Scherner's past alleged exploitation of children can be considered by the jury during its deliberations, set to begin this morning. In addition to the alleged victim in the case, now 14 years old, four women — three of them relatives — testified during the trial that Scherner molested them as children.

During closing arguments, defense attorney Anthony Savage told the jury to go ahead and assume that those four women were molested by Scherner but that he did not molest the girl involved in the current charges. "[She] is a liar," he said.

Scherner, of Carmel, Calif., was arrested and charged in 2003, after the California girl told her mother that Scherner molested her on a family vacation in Bellevue. On the witness stand last week, the girl said Scherner invited her into his bed, touched her sexually and forced her to touch him.

He faces 12 to 16 years in prison if convicted as charged.

In the case, prosecutors have used a new law that makes it easier to bring evidence of a defendant's past alleged sexual offenses into trial. Savage continually objected to its use Wednesday during closing arguments, in which Kays told the jury, "History repeats itself."

But Superior Court Judge Richard Eadie said the argument that a defendant's past actions show a tendency or proclivity for a particular offense is allowed. "That is the sea change in the law," he said.

Defense attorneys observing the case this week said they expect the new law soon to face challenges in higher state courts.

"Improprieties"

Scherner began the day Wednesday denying having ever touched any child sexually. The admissions he then made spilled out slowly over the course of about an hour of cross-examination.

Scherner stated that he went to therapy in 1987, spurred by "accusations" from one girl, a now-29-year-old relative who is not the one involved in the current charges.

"[She] accused you of what?" Kays asked.

"Of improprieties," Scherner answered.

"If you didn't commit this unspeakable act, why did you go into treatment?" countered Kays.

"I've had a very intermittent problem of sexual abuse of children," he said.

"Were you attracted to little girls or little boys?"

"The problem was ... young women. It was a matter of opportunity combined with some alcohol, that created a problem that needed to be taken care of."

"I've yet to hear you admit to molesting little girls," Kays said.

"I had molested my granddaughter," Scherner then said. That girl, 8 at the time and now an adult, spoke with police as part of a far-reaching investigation into Scherner's history.

"I would tuck her in, [perform] oral sex, massage her. That was it," he stated on the stand.

Scherner testified that he never reoffended after the therapy, of which there are no records.

"Are you telling me that you were cured?" Kays pressed him.

"Yes," he said.

Relatives testify

Over the course of the two-week trial, various members of the large family have either testified or were present in the courtroom. Some said the events behind the case have torn the family apart, a theme both attorneys touched on during closing arguments.

Savage told the jury that because the girl Scherner is charged with molesting added to her story over the years, she is not credible.

"She has been fed this family history, as uncomfortable and dismal as it is, and she and the family is here to get even. ... She is now a teenager, who is just as capable of lying as any other teenager."

Kays painted a different picture.

For decades, she said, "It was a dirty little secret. It took a brave girl to open the door, pull up the rug and see what was underneath."

Natalie Singer: 206-464-2704 or nsinger@seattletimes.com