Roy couple enters guilty plea

Standard-Examiner (Ogden, UT)

Author: TIM GURRISTER

Standard-Examiner staff

tgurrister@standard.net

OGDEN -- A Roy couple accused of beating and neglecting their young adoptive son have pleaded guilty to reduced charges, having already lost their parental rights.

Scott and Catherine Kanani Nelson had been charged with second-degree felony child abuse in the beating and neglect of the boy. The Samoan 8-year-old was forced to live in his underwear on a concrete stairway landing or in a shed with no heat or bedding, Roy police said, calling the case one of the worst they'd seen.

Charges were filed Feb. 17 of this year, and Scott Nelson resigned his job as a Salt Lake County correctional officer a month later after he'd been placed on paid administrative leave because of the charges.

Wednesday in 2nd District Court, the pair pleaded guilty to child abuse charges reduced to third-degree felonies in a plea bargain. Sentencing was set for Jan. 12 before Judge W. Brent West.

"It's the difference between intentional and reckless," said defense attorney Gary Barr after Wednesday's hearing, unusually vocal in defending the Nelsons, saying police inflated the case with leading questions of the children involved.

"I've never said it was good what they did," Barr said. "But rather than intentional, it was reckless, is the difference in the law."

Oddly enough, the Nelsons had hopes of getting the boy and his little sister back until officials terminated their parental rights.

Barr also represented the Nelsons in 2nd District Juvenile Court where prosecutors held a hearing to successfully severe the Nelson's parental rights regarding both the 8-year-old and his 2-year-old sister, whom they had adopted from Samoa.

"These were people who tried to have children for a long time but couldn't," Barr said. "They spent a ton of money on the adoptions then they made some bad judgments" regarding discipline.

A juvenile judge considered granting custody of the two youths to the Nelson's parents, but decided the likely encounters with the Nelsons would be too traumatic.

The state Division of Child and Family Services took immediate custody, but proceedings regarding the children since are private.