Havre man pleads guilty to sex abuse charges

A jury trial scheduled to begin today was canceled after a man accused of possessing lewd pictures of a 16-year-old girl pleaded guilty during a change of plea hearing Friday in state District Court in Havre.

Gary L. Peterson, of Havre, born in 1967, was charged with 32 counts of sexual abuse of children Dec. 19.

He pleaded guilty Friday to three of those counts before District Judge Daniel Boucher.

Due to Peterson’s change of plea, the state dismissed the remaining counts.

Peterson in January pleaded not guilty to all charges.

The plea agreement was filed Friday.

During the hearing, Boucher set a sentencing hearing for Wednesday, July 13, at 1:30 p.m. at the Hill County Courthouse.

According to court documents, in June 2013, Havre Police received a report that an employee at the District 4 Human Resources Development Council discovered nude images of a girl at the HRDC building on 5th Avenue while looking for computer equipment in an office within the building. The employee suspected the photos were of the daughter of Peterson’s girlfriend. The daughter was 16 years old at the time the images were taken.

When interviewed by Havre Police, Peterson told officers that he was unable to explain how the photos would have ended up at his workplace.

Authorities interviewed Peterson’s then-girlfriend, who said she knew nothing about the photos. She did, however, tell authorities that Peterson had an HRDC-owned laptop computer that he had never returned and that the laptop was kept locked in his garage.

The court documents go on to say the then-girlfriend allowed officers to inspect the home. Officers discovered in a bathroom that was primarily used by the victim, a poster with a pencil-sized hole that was aligned with another pencil-sized hole in the bathroom wall. She said she had seen wires in a room in the basement Peterson frequented and that she had seen a four-part screen on the basement computer, which she suspected was linked to surveillance cameras around the residence.

The woman also told officers that Peterson had ordered and recently pawned a boroscope, which is a small flexible tube-type scope that is able to look through holes in the walls, under doors and around corners.