A jury trial was set for a 54-year-old man from Apple Valley, MN charged with interference with privacy; 5th degree assault, inflicting or attempting bodily harm; and trespassing after he was caught peeping into the window of a home on the Croftville Road in Grand Marais. However, the charges were lessened on Tuesday, May 11, 2010 when the defendant, Lee Brian Sorenson, 54, pled guilty to interference with privacy, entering a home or peeping in a window, a gross misdemeanor.
Sorenson was caught outside the home of George Wilkes and Barb LaVigne on June 7, 2009. In his guilty plea, Sorenson admitted he was walking on Croftville Road when he saw a home with lights on. He admitted walking up to the home to look in the windows. He acknowledged that he knew that constituted an invasion of privacy. Asked by Cook County Attorney Tim Scannell if he looked into the windows with the intent to observe the occupants, Sorenson said yes.
Scannell explained that a plea agreement had been reached. The county agreed to drop two of the counts. Sorenson will be required to pay a $400 fine and will undergo psychiatric evaluation. Scannell said the preliminary pre-sentencing investigation conducted by probation discovered that Sorenson had been involved in a similar offense in 1991. For that reason, probation officer Scott Johnson recommended that the assessment be a psychosexual evaluation.
Sorenson’s attorney, Christopher Stocke, said he and his client did not agree that the psychosexual evaluation was necessary, since it had been 19 years since the previous incident. Stocke suggested that a general psychological evaluation be completed. He said if that evaluation reveals a need for further evaluation, they would not dispute that, but added, “We feel a full psycho-sexual evaluation now would be premature.”
Scannell and Stocke agreed to leave the decision in Judge Kenneth Sandvik’s hands. Before he made his decision, Sandvik noted a victim impact statement from George Wilkes, written on behalf of himself, his wife and his two daughters, who were 20 and 17 at the time of the incident.
Wilkes wrote, “Everyone—and young women especially—should have the right to expect that when they are in their homes at night, they are not being watched by a 50-year-old man standing unseen outside their window. Surely Mr. Sorenson would have that expectation for himself and his family…
“My family and I hope that Mr. Sorenson realizes the insidious nature of his crime and that he will never do anything like this to anyone else ever again.”
Sandvik then made his determination, giving the defendant 45 days in which to complete an evaluation—a psychosexual evaluation. Referring to the previous charge, Sandvik said, “While it is an old offense, it is the kind of offense that causes the court concern.”
Sorenson returns to court for sentencing on July 7, 2010.
Leave a Reply