Published Oct 16, 2008
A man convicted of assaulting his ex-girlfriend and threatening her with a kitchen knife was remanded to Virginia a little earlier than expected after he violated the terms of his probation, according to the District Attorney’s office.
Stephen Montano, 26, of Rowe, was originally charged with three counts of rape and nine other felonies for an April 2007 incident in which he allegedly broke into his ex-girlfriend’s Guachupange house and raped her repeatedly under the threat of death, according to court documents. One of the rape counts was amended to aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, and the other 11 charges were dismissed July 18, 2008, Assistant District Attorney Jason Montclaire said.
Montano’s plea deal was made after the state Department of Public Safety crime lab returned DNA evidence linking Montano to the alleged rape too late to be admissable in court, according to Montclaire. Inconsistencies in witness statements given by the victim’s 17-year-old cousin further weakened the case, he said.
Montano was sentenced Aug. 12 to time served plus four months of probation, after which he was to be remanded to Virginia. However, the probation office reported Montano began causing problems immediately by being “resistant” to Adult Probation and Parole office staff and appearing “extremely unhappy” to be placed under intensive supervision.
Montano told probation officers he didn’t have a working phone at his house for the electronic monitoring system, and then he never showed up to the probation office the following morning to download the GPS information verifying his residence, according to a probation violation report.
After being arrested for failure to comply with his terms of probation, Montano claimed his noncompliance was caused by “extreme stress,” court documents state.
Montclare said that at the outcome of a Sept. 22 probation violation hearing, Montano was “unsuccessfully terminated” from his probation and remanded to the state of Virginia.
“The idea was we didn’t want him to be here, near the victim,” Montclare said.