After a three-day trial, Steven O’Bryant was found guilty Friday of three counts of Child Molesting as a Class A felony and not guilty of one count of the same.
The jury deliberated for less than 2 hours, having left at 1:04 p.m. and returned at 2:55 p.m. after asking only one question.
A dozen witnesses were called during the course of the trial, including ten from the state and two from the defense. The victim himself was called as a witness by the state, as well as the victim’s mother, sister, aunt, and brother, Sgt. Harold Smith, Jr., a forensic employee of the CASIE Center, Clinical Psychologist Julia Kocal, Detective Dave Combs, and the forensic examiner who performed the examination on the victim.
The defense called only two juvenile witnesses.
Forty-three-year-old Steven L. O’Bryant was found guilty of molesting a juvenile while he stayed at that juvenile’s Starke County residence over the course of two months from March 30 to May 30. O’Bryant had previously been released from the Department of Corrections on June 6, 2011, after serving time in another Starke County case for the murder of an elderly Knox woman 25 years ago, on Oct. 28, 1987. He was released from the Department of Corrections on parole June 27, 2011, and he was released from parole on Jan. 9 this year.
He will face his sentencing on Dec. 6 at 2 p.m. in the Starke Circuit Court.
