CONCORD, N.H., March 18 (UPI) — Owen Labrie, the prep school student who was convicted of misdemeanor assault after a rape trial that made national headlines, is behind bars in New Hampshire after a judge revoked his bail, saying Labrie violated a court-imposed curfew.
After sentencing in October, Labrie’s attorney filed a motion to appeal the conviction and the judge in the case agreed to grant Labrie bail while the appeal was being heard. That bail came with restrictions, including a curfew that only allowed Labrie to leave his home between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m.
A reporter for Vice spotted Labrie on an afternoon train coming out of Boston, within the parameters of his curfew. Labrie told the Vice reporter when she approached him that he was coming from a lunch date with his girlfriend, who he’d been seeing since before the trial. When the incident was reported, it prompted prosecutors to look into his travel schedule in and around Boston.
Prosecutors said the resulting evidence, including security footage and credit card transactions, showed Labrie violated his bail curfew by leaving before or arriving home after the allotted hours on seven occasions. The judge agreed Friday and revoked Labrie’s bail. He will begin serving time against his one-year jail sentence immediately.
Labrie was convicted in August of misdemeanor sexual assault for having sex with a girl too young to consent, while they were both students at the upscale New England prep academy, St. Paul School. He was acquitted by a jury of a more serious felony aggravated rape charge.
The victim, then 15, alleged at trial Labrie raped her as part of a competition between senior boys at the school called the “Senior Salute.”
Labrie, now 20, described the encounter as mutual and denied he forcibly assaulted the girl. He has had to register as a sex offender as a result of the conviction, and will remain on that registry for life.
