Lawyer speaks for mother of little girl shown in Nevada sex tape

By: KEN RITTER - Associated Press | Tuesday, October 2, 2007 7:33 PM PDT ∞

LAS VEGAS -- The lawyer for a woman whose daughter was videotaped being sexually assaulted said Tuesday that he hoped the young girl's attacker would be captured or kill himself.

"Speaking as a father myself, I wish the guy would dig a hole in the desert and put a gun in his mouth," Attorney Jerry Donohue said. "Wild West justice, the way I see it."

Police and the FBI are conducting a nationwide manhunt for Chester "Chet" Arthur Stiles, 37, who they consider armed and dangerous.

Police say the girl was about 3 years old when she was raped and assaulted by Stiles, who recorded the attack on videotape. He has been described as a violent survivalist who always carries a weapon and has a string of arrests dating to 1999.

Donohue pleaded for privacy for the family, and said the mother was cooperating with the police search. He would not identify the woman during a brief statement outside his office.

The mother had "no relationship with Stiles. None at all," Donohue said, and said the abuse appeared to have happened when the girl was left in the care of a baby sitter.

Donohue called the woman "a typical American single mother" who he said worked six days a week and was "trying to be 'supermom."'

"This event is believed to have occurred while she was at work," Donohue said, adding that a six-month time frame when the abuse could have taken place might have been shortly before the girl turned 3.

He said the mother learned of the search to identify her daughter last week, when a friend recognized a news photo drawn from the video and telephoned her.

Authorities have said the 30-minute tape was recorded four years ago in Las Vegas and surfaced last month.

Donohue told reporters that he and the mother had not seen the video.

The girl, now 7, spent a recent afternoon with medical professionals, Donohue said, adding that she appeared to be "happy, perfectly healthy little girl."

"I believe she has no memory of this event," Donohue said, adding he could not be sure how much of the sexual abuse she remembered.

Police Capt. Vincent Cannito called Stiles "a very dangerous individual" with a violent past.

He was being sought on an unrelated warrant issued last year charging him with fleeing to avoid prosecution on allegations he groped a 6-year-old girl in 2003.

Police have said Stiles had a string of arrests on charges including assault, battery, resisting a police officer, auto theft, leaving the scene of an accident and contempt of court.

He was convicted in 1999 in Las Vegas of carrying a concealed weapon, and in 2001 of conspiracy to commit grand larceny, according to court records. Stiles also pleaded no contest in Houston in 1993 to unlawful carrying of a weapon.

Cannito said police were checking hundreds of tips received since authorities named Stiles as the suspect in the case.

The district attorney in Nye County, where authorities first learned of the tape and pleaded for help to find the girl last week, also identified Stiles as a "survivalist type" who claimed to have weapons, a Navy SEAL background and always carried a knife. However, District Attorney Bob Beckett said he could not confirm the information.

Tina Allen, a former girlfriend in Las Vegas, told CNN's "Larry King Live" on Monday night that she worried Stiles might emerge from hiding to harm her and said she would seek police protection.

Las Vegas police spokesman Jose Montoya said Tuesday that detectives hoped to meet with Allen by Wednesday.

The video came to light last month after a man claimed to have found it in the desert outside Pahrump, a Nye County town about 60 miles west of Las Vegas. Sheriff's officials said Darrin Tuck, 26, had it for as long as five months and showed it to others before turning it in.

Tuck was being held after his arrest on a probation violation, and will likely face pornography charges, Beckett said.

The Associated Press is no longer identifying or releasing photos of the girl because she is a suspected victim of sexual abuse. It did so earlier in the interest of her safe recovery.