Man sentenced in sexual assault case

Kenneth R. Rogers Jr. was sentenced to 4-8 years with the Wyoming Department of Corrections after entering an Alford plea to one count of Sexual Assault of a Minor in the Third Degree, a felony.

District Court Judge Bobbi Overfield accepted the plea agreement as outlined by a Plea Change Hearing Order. The state dismissed four other original charges. Rogers was given credit for time served in the amount of 353 days.

Rogers was arrested on December 28, 2018, along with Kimberly Sams. At that time, they were each charged with multiple felonies.

According to court documents, Sams coerced Rogers into sexually assaulting a juvenile female between Aug. 1 and Sept. 30, 2018, and forced the molestations to occur by threatening both Rogers and the juvenile with photographic evidence of the incidents.

Sams was sentenced in October to 4-8 years for one count each of accessory before the fact and blackmail.

Deputy Hot Springs County Attorney Curtis Cheney commented during the Sams sentencing that the abuse case began with rumors of photographs being used for blackmail.

Rather than reporting what was happening, he said, Sams used it to her own purposes and allowed the abuse to continue.

An Alford Plea is a guilty plea of a defendant who proclaims innocence but admits that the prosecution has enough evidence to prove that his is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.