Accused of molesting young girls, Winchester man denied bail

Dec. 06--Prosecutors have charged a Winchester man with sexual assault after two women told police he abused them as children.

The women, who are sisters, said Richard P. Soulia, 57, would touch their genitalia. The sisters, now 20 and 17, both said the abuse began when they were less than 10 years old. The younger sister said Soulia assaulted her as recently as last spring, when, she said, he groped her over her clothes and then stuck his hand down her pants during an outing on an ATV.

Their accounts of the alleged abuse were relayed in two affidavits written by Winchester police Detective Michael W. Carrier, as well as in Carrier's testimony during a hearing Wednesday afternoon in Cheshire County Superior Court.

At the hearing, Judge David W. Ruoff ordered Soulia held without bail.

Soulia's lawyer, public defender Jennifer Cohen, argued court-ordered restrictions -- such as electronic monitoring and no contact with minors -- could allow Soulia to stay out of jail while his case went forward.

But Assistant County Attorney John Webb said conditions of release wouldn't be enough to ensure public safety.

"It's the state's position that an order won't stop him, any more than the law stopped him," Webb said.

Soulia is charged with five counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault and one misdemeanor count of sexual assault. Pleas of not guilty to the charges were entered Wednesday.

Soulia faced similar charges in 2010, when prosecutors alleged he had molested the younger sister and a different girl -- not one of the sisters -- in 2009. Both girls were under 13 at the time.

He went to trial in 2010 on the two felony sexual assault charges involving the younger sister, but the case ended in a hung jury when jurors could not reach a unanimous verdict.

The following year, Soulia pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor count of simple assault involving the other girl. Prosecutors dropped three felony charges against him, including the two on which the jury deadlocked.

For the misdemeanor charge, Soulia was sentenced to one year in jail, which was deferred and then suspended on condition of good behavior.

Though that charge did not mention a sexual component -- it stated only that Soulia touched the 12-year-old girl's "chest area without permission" -- a judge ordered him to undergo a psychosexual evaluation and forbade him from sleeping in the same room as children under 18.

On Wednesday, Judge Ruoff noted that the 2011 guilty plea factored into his decision to detain Soulia.

"This carries a lot of weight with the court," Ruoff said. "... You pled guilty to it, a prior allegation against a little girl," even if it wasn't a sexual-assault conviction.

Speaking to a police officer in August 2018, the younger sister said Soulia did not stop molesting her after the 2010 trial, according to one of Detective Carrier's affidavits.

The older sister told police Soulia first molested her when she was 7 or 8 and then assaulted or tried to assault her at least four more times over the next six to seven years, Carrier wrote in another affidavit.

"(She) said Soulia made her feel confused about herself and she wanted to crawl out of her own skin," Carrier wrote.

Paul Cuno-Booth can be reached at 352-1234, extension 1409, or pbooth@keenesentinel.com. Follow him on Twitter @PCunoBoothKS.

___

(c)2018 The Keene Sentinel (Keene, N.H.)

Visit The Keene Sentinel (Keene, N.H.) at www.sentinelsource.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.