Sexual abuse of 2 YDC teens by guard continued after they aged out of the system, prosecutor says

MANCHESTER, NH – As a guard at the Youth Development Center in the 1990s, Stanley Watson sexually groomed two teenage boys, coercing them to engage in sex and then continued the sexual relationships after their release from the juvenile detention center, according to a prosecutor.

The trial of Watson, 55, of 60 Clement Road, Allenstown, on three counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault, opened Tuesday in Hillsborough County Superior Court Northern District.

Watson denies the allegations although he admits to the sexual relationships with the boys after they aged out of the Youth Detention Center (YDC), now known as the Sununu Youth Services Center on River Road.

The allegations go back to 1997 and 1998 and involve two boys who were 14-years-old when they were first court-ordered to be detained at the YDC.  Watson is accused of engaging in fellatio with the teens in their bedrooms and in a laundry room.

Defense attorney William Korman, in his opening statement, said there was nothing wrong with the relationships outside of YDC because the teens were at the age of consent once they left the juvenile detention facility.  He noted Watson is not facing criminal charges connected to that conduct.

He also told the jury of six women and seven men (one will later be named an alternate) that the “devil is in the details.”  He maintained that the two accusers fabricated the allegations for financial gain.

Manchester Ink Link is identifying the alleged victims only by their initials, C. S. and A.C., because of the sexual nature of the charges.

Korman said both obtained loans in anticipation of a settlement payment from the civil lawsuit they each filed against the state of New Hampshire concerning the abusive treatment they received as juveniles while in the state’s care.

More than 1,000 people have filed lawsuits against the state, alleging they were physically, sexually and/or emotionally abused while detained as juveniles in state-run or contracted facilities. Legislators have set aside $160 million for payment to victims.

Korman also said the two accusers were sent to YDC because of criminal conduct and because they had no place to go.  He said when they were released it “wasn’t the end of their criminal conduct.”

Assistant New Hampshire Attorney General Nicholas Chong Yen, in his opening statement, said Watson was a 27-year-old sexual predator at the juvenile detention center which operated like a prison.   The culture in the facility was one of a “brotherhood” where staff protected themselves.

Yen said the two men who said Watson sexually assaulted them did not know each other.  Both came forward 25 years after the alleged assaults and told similar stories about Watson.  One was assigned to Stark House at YDC, while the other was a resident of Spaulding Cottage. Both alleged the sexual assaults happened inside their assigned houses at night.

Watson mostly worked the night shift and presented himself as a “friendly guy,” Yen said. He became the guy both C.S. and A.C. confided in.  He was the one adult who gave them attention and appeared to care for them.

Watson worked from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. which gave him access to the children, Yen told the jurors. He would make nightly rounds oftentimes alone, shining his flashlight on the children as they slept.

Watson groomed C.S. and A.C., establishing an emotional connection with the vulnerable teens before ultimately sexually abusing them, according to the prosecution.

He gave them special privileges, letting them out of their locked bedrooms after curfew.  At first, he touched them on their shoulders; then he brushed up against them with his pelvis; then he touched their legs, inching closer to their groins.  Ultimately, his touching escalated to oral sex.

The abuse, Yen said, took place at night when there was no staff or children around (the children were locked in their rooms), a time when no one could catch him.

Watson was in a position of authority over the children, according to the charges.  “They had no one they could turn to and if they did, who would believe them.  They were children,” Yen said.

They also feared if they did tell that they would be “retaliated against by the brotherhood,” the prosecutor said.

The sexual abuse didn’t end when the two teens left YDC, Yen said.  “Watson contacted them after they aged out,” Yen said, describing what happened next.  “This defendant [Watson] was [at the time] 30 years old.  He had sex with the boys outside of YDC.”

Watson, Yen said, denies having any sexual contact with the boys at YDC but admits post YDC sex with both.

“He admits the conduct he can afford to admit and he denies the conduct he can’t afford to admit,” Yen told the jurors.  “The post YDC sex was the continuation of sexual abuse.”

This is the third trial of former state employees accused of sexually abusing teenagers at state-operated facilities.

The first criminal trial against Victor Malavet, charged with a dozen counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault of children in 2001 at a Concord facility, ended in September with a hung jury. A new trial is scheduled for June.

In November, Bradley Asbury, 69, was found guilty of holding down a 14-year-old boy in a staircase with another employee as two other youth counselors raped him in the 1990s. He is to be sentenced Jan. 27 but is already being detained in the New Hampshire State Prison.

Watson’s trial is expected to last three days.