Fired city parks groundskeeper Harold Villanueva Jr. insisted at his sentencing in state court for misdemeanor sexual assault Tuesday that he did not
grab the victim’s buttock.
“I didn’t pinch her, I pushed her,” he said in anticipation of a jail sentence and reception by other inmates.
Villanueva, 49, pleaded
no contest to fourth-degree sexual assault in August.
The crime involves someone subjecting another person
to sexual contact by compulsion.
Circuit Judge Christine Kuriyama sentenced Villanueva to a year of probation, including seven days in jail. Villanueva will get credit for the two days he spent in custody following his arrest in July 2016 and has until Dec. 4 to turn himself in to serve the other five days.
“I believe that you are in need of treatment and services,” Kuriyama told Villanueva.
Kuriyama also ordered
Villanueva to pay $180 in court-related fees.
Villanueva had asked Kuriyama to grant him a deferral of his no-contest plea to give him the opportunity to avoid conviction. Kuriyama denied the request and stated her reasons in a prepared statement she read on the record.
The sentence requires
Villanueva to register as a convicted sex offender for the rest of his life.
Makana Milho, 22,
reported to police that she was performing court-ordered community service under Villanueva’s supervision when Villanueva molested her. She said Villanueva told her not to tell anyone what he did because no one
would believe her.
Milho also posted online
a video she secretly recorded of a man telling her she can go home early in exchange for sexual favors. She said the man was Villanueva.
Villanueva told court
officials ahead of Tuesday’s sentencing that Milho propositioned him. Milho told Kuriyama that wasn’t true.
“I never told Mr. Villanueva that I would perform sexual acts on him so I could leave my probation early,” she said.
Milho also told Kuriyama that she never did anything to suggest that sexual acts or touching were welcome.
In her written statement
to the court, Milho, who
declares herself a proud transgender woman, said the sexual assault had so shaken her that she has trouble sleeping and has caused her to feel uncomfortable in her own body and to question her worth and identity.
She said after the sentencing that she is happy with the outcome.
