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| Carl Gabrielse |
07/21/2011
By John Agar
HOLLAND – A woman sexually assaulted by a Holland deputy attorney during plea negotiations in her drunken-driving case has settled her federal lawsuit against the attorney, Carl Gabrielse, and the city, court records showed.
Settlement details have not been filed.
Mediator Thomas Koernke said in court documents that the case was settled in full, with final paperwork to be filed by July 8. The parties were to have mediation on Wednesday.
Gabrielse was sentenced to six months in jail in April 2010 for third-degree criminal sexual conduct and misconduct in office. After he successfully completed probation, including sex-offender counseling, he was allowed to plead guilty to a lesser charge of gross indecency between a male and female, a five-year felony.
The gross-indecency charge does not require Gabrielse to be on the state sex-offender registry.
The woman said Gabrielse raped her in the bathroom of the jury room at Holland District Court. He and the victim were discussing a plea deal after she had been arrested for drunken driving. “Sadly, it resulted in the rape of the plaintiff by a public official in the confines of a jury room bathroom,” her attorney wrote.
The city said it had no legal responsibility because “Mr. Gabrielse's alleged actions were secret, unlawful and deviated from the guidelines he was given.”
Gabrielse was associate of Cunningham Dalman law firm, and periodically worked for the city under his employer's contract.
His attorneys said in court filings that the woman, during a pretrial conference on her drunken-driving charge, “proceeded to inform Mr. Gabrielse that she was willing to exchange sexual favors for a reduction in her charge.”
- So what? He is a person in a position of trust, and he abused it, even if she wanted it or not!
He argued that sex was consensual, and denied “any and all allegations that he sexually assaulted” the woman, records showed.
Her attorney said she wasn't willing to have sex with Gabrielse, and said that “his statement of the case is contradicted by his own guilty plea.”
She was sentenced to probation and fines for impaired driving.
Gabrielse's law license has been suspended three years for "professional misconduct," records showed.
- It should be suspended for life!
