South Dakota Woman Pleads Guilty to Making False Statements
| U.S. Attorney’s Office August 01, 2011 |
BISMARCK—United States Attorney Timothy Q. Purdon announced that on August 1, 2011, Victoria Bobtail Bear, 46, of McLaughlin, South Dakota, pleaded guilty to a charge of false statements in United States District Court.
On November 30, 2010, Bobtail Bear was arrested by a Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) police office on a charge of disorderly conduct. Bobtail Bear was placed in the BIA officer’s patrol vehicle and was transported to the detention facility in Fort Yates. Bobtail Bear later reported to a BIA criminal investigator that she had been sexually assaulted by the BIA police officer en route to the detention center. The accused officer had recorded the entire event, from arrest to transport to the detention facility, on his lapel camera, which indicated that at no time did the officer carry on with any type of inappropriate conduct with Bobtail Bear.
The charge of false statements carries a statutory maximum penalty of five years’ imprisonment and a $250,000 fine.
The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Bureau of Indian Affairs - Standing Rock Agency.
Sentencing for Bobtail Bear has been scheduled for October 20, 2011, in United States District Court in Bismarck, North Dakota, at 1:30 p.m.
Assistant United States Attorney Gary Delorme is prosecuting the case.