Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Girl’s parents testify in trial of accused rapist

Updated Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2009 | 7:34 p.m.

Chester Arthur Stiles

Chester Arthur Stiles

Family members of a young girl who has accused Chester A. Stiles of molesting her when she was 6 years old appeared in court Tuesday.

The girl's mother, who began her testimony Monday, said when her daughter first told her that Stiles had kissed her, she didn't take her seriously. Initially, she said, she thought he had just kissed her on the cheek when he left the family's house.

"When she said it a couple of times, I realized it was more than just a kiss on the cheek," the girl's mother said during questioning from Deputy District Attorney Mary Kay Holthus. The girl is now 11 years old.

The alleged attack took place in December 2003 when Stiles, who witnesses Tuesday called "Chet," was a guest in the family's Las Vegas home. Stiles, the boyfriend of Tina Allen, a friend of the young girl's mother, had been invited by Allen to stay the night. Allen had asked to stay overnight because she had recently lost her job and been kicked out of her home.

Stiles also is charged with molesting a second girl. He is accused of videotaping the incident, and the case made national headlines when images from the tape were released in an attempt to identify the girl and the man in the videotape. The girl in the tape, who was 2 years old at the time, is not expected to take the stand.

Evidence in the alleged assault involving the younger girl hasn’t been presented.

In the case of the older girl, family members testified that two family friends were at the home the night after Allen and Stiles left. The 6-year-old girl began whispering into her mother's ear what she said Stiles had done to her.

After telling her mother that Chet had kissed her with his tongue, "She whispered in my ear again ... that Chester pulled her pants down," the mother said Tuesday in court.

She said she repeated aloud in front of the family friends every comment her daughter whispered into her ear because she was in shock and felt someone else needed to hear it, she testified.

The girl's mother said her daughter told her she had complained of pain when he touched her genitals and that she had to use the restroom and was going to throw up, but Stiles kept telling her to "hold on," the mother said. The girl said he finally allowed her to go to the bathroom.

She said the girl then returned to her bedroom and, because she was afraid Stiles would come back, she hid under her bed. She then left her room and crawled into bed with her parents. Despite her parents telling her to return to her room, the girl stayed in their room and slept at the foot of the bed, her mother recalled.

The woman said she spoke with her daughter in front of the family friends as well as her husband, the girl's father, who joined the conversation. The family then called 911 and Metro Police responded. The girl was taken to Sunrise Hospital, where she was examined for abuse.

The girl stayed with her father during her hospital exam. The mother, accompanied by a Metro Police detective, went to look for Stiles so he could be questioned. He was not found at that time, records show.

"After the incident, she was scared to be alone; scared to be in her room," the mother said. She also told the court that although the girl had been potty-trained for at least two years, she began having accidents during the night. The girl became plagued by nightmares and problems at school, her mother testified.

Public defender Amy Coffee queried the mother as to why she repeated to family friends everything her daughter said aloud.

"I was crying; I think I was in shock and she just kept telling me more stuff," the mother said. The mother also expressed frustration because detectives had told her she was not allowed to talk with her daughter about what had happened to her.

"They told me all I was allowed to do was listen," she said.

After a few questions from the jury to clarify some of her testimony, the woman was excused.

The married couple that was close with the girl's grandfather and at the family's home on the night of the alleged attack also testified Tuesday.

The girl’s grandfather, who has since died, lived with the family in Las Vegas.

The man said that when he arrived at the home with his wife for a cookout, the girl, who was normally shy, latched onto him and told him repeatedly that she had a boyfriend who had kissed her. He said he had initially thought it was a boy at school, and was dismissive toward her.

But the man, who said the girl and her siblings looked at him as a sort of "second grandfather," said the look of shock that appeared on the girl's mother's face as her daughter whispered in her ear caught his attention.

That, he said, was "when all hell broke loose."

As the girl spoke with her mother, her father called 911. A recording of the phone call was played in court Tuesday. On the tape, he tells the dispatcher "my daughter is telling me that she's been molested." On several occasions, the dispatcher presses him for details and he is heard asking questions of his family. The voice of a young child, presumably his daughter, is heard answering.

He told the dispatcher that Stiles drove a blue Toyota pickup truck and might be returning to the family's home that night. The dispatcher said if he arrived, don’t let the man know police have been alerted.

"I don't know much about this guy at all," he says in the 911 call. Stiles and Allen didn’t appear at the home that night, and it wasn't until much later that Stiles was interviewed by police for the first time.

Also on the stand Tuesday was Dr. Neha Mehta, a physician from Sunrise Hospital whose duties include examining children who say they have been sexually abused. While she didn't personally examine the young girl, she was on duty when the child came to the hospital and had signed off on the medical report.

The examining physician has since moved out of state and wouldn’t testify, attorneys said.

Both the defense and prosecution quizzed Mehta on the girl's medical records. She said the only item of note the examining doctor had marked was some redness and irritation in the genital area. The jury was presented a diagram on which Mehta showed the precise area where the girl's symptoms appeared.

Any number of reasons could have caused the redness, Mehta said, but she noted it was consistent with being touched by a finger or hand. She said that in girls who have not yet started their menstrual periods, touching the area is perceived as painful or uncomfortable.

The girl was referred to her pediatrician for a follow-up. Doctors didn’t order a rape kit, Mehta said.

Although nurses said in the medical report that blood was not evident on the girl's underwear, her parents and a Metro Police detective asked that they be collected as evidence.

Officers from Metro Police and the Nye County Sheriff's Office are expected to testify in court Wednesday.

Stiles faces 22 charges of sexual assault and lewdness, 21 of which can carry a life sentence.

Join the Discussion:

Check this out for a full explanation of our conversion to the LiveFyre commenting system and instructions on how to sign up for an account.

Full comments policy