Rapist may face charge in 1990 case

An 18-year-old allegation of a sexual assault on a child may keep an inmate scheduled to be freed this month in prison longer.

Steven Wilson may face new charges related to an incident in 1990 while he was working at a Hardee's in Nashville while on release as a prisoner at Nash Correctional Institute. Wilson, 52, is one of 20 inmates to be freed next Thursday after the state Court of Appeals agreed that he and dozens of other criminals punished with life sentences have served their time.

Since Gov. Beverly Perdue announced their release last week, state officials have been scrambling for any way to keep these inmates behind bars. They've expressed concerns that these inmates are hardened criminals who will prey on innocent victims if turned loose into society.

In Wilson's case, prison officials and prosecutors have been reviewing records related to an attack on a 7-year-old girl in a Hardee's restaurant restroom, said Keith Acree, spokesman for the state Department of Correction.

Acree said that the manager of the restaurant alerted prison officials after the girl's mother complained that Wilson had sexually assaulted the girl. The matter was investigated by prison officials; Acree said they have heard that the child's parents were unwilling to press charges so no criminal investigation was launched.

Wilson denied the allegation, saying he was not in the restroom at the time of the assault, Acree said.

In North Carolina, there's no expiration date on felony charges. Still, the efforts to open new cases against inmates who've spent more than half their lives in prison are alarming to some legal experts.

"This is troubling," said Dave Rudolf, a criminal and civil lawyer who has expressed concern about the public discourse surrounding these inmates. "We can't live in a country in which someone decides at the end of a sentence that it wasn't long enough and change it."

Rudolf said reviving an old case is tricky, as memories of witnesses fade and evidence may be lost.

Lenoir County prosecutors initially prosecuted Wilson in 1978 on charges of abducting and raping a 9-year-old girl. Branny Vickory, Lenoir County district attorney, says he was called by prison officials late last week and asked to explore the possibility of bringing new charges against Wilson in the 1990 incident, which happened outside his jurisdiction.

"They saw a red flag in their system and were looking for any way to bring a new case against him," Vickory said. Vickory said he would alert his counterpart in Nash County, where prison officials say the incident happened. Acree said prison officials are forwarding their file on the incident to Nash County District Attorney Robert A. Evans. He could not be reached Wednesday.

After the 1990 complaint, Wilson was taken off work duty, Acree said. He was transferred to a more secure prison and placed in lockdown. He also lost 30 days of credit for time served without any incidents.

Prison records indicate that Wilson was punished by prison officials so that he would understand that sexual violence would not be tolerated, Acree said.

According to prison records, Wilson plans to move to Jacksonville, Fla., when he is released.

Wilson owes his release to the appeals court ruling, which confirmed that a 1974 law defined life sentences as 80 years. Later sentencing laws awarded credit to offenders who served their time without incident; that policy essentially cut sentences in half. Inmates such as Wilson reduced their 40-year sentence further with credit for working jobs and earning degrees.

Will he prey again?

Their release has been met with outrage from public officials, who suggest that these prisoners will prey on innocent victims once they are released. Of particular concern to them are 10 of the inmates who were initially convicted of sex crimes.

Studies show that sexual offenders relapse into crime at lower rates than criminals in general. Overall, about 12 percent of sexual criminals will reoffend within five years of release from prison, said Elliot Cramer, a retired UNC-Chapel Hill professor who has studied recidivism rates for sex offenders.

Risk increases for offenders whose victims were strangers and who had previously committed other violent, nonsexual crimes.

Rates of relapsing into crime drop considerably as offenders age, Cramer said.

"The bottom line," Cramer said, "is nobody can predict the future for these people."

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