Kidnapper insists he did not rape teen
A truck driver who injected a girl with "ice" faces 20 years
A former Big Brothers Big Sisters of Honolulu delivery driver accused of kidnapping a 17-year-old girl, sexually assaulting her and injecting her with "ice" over an eight-hour period has admitted to restraining her but denied raping her.
Anton Myklebust, 28, of Aliamanu pleaded guilty yesterday before Circuit Judge Karl Sakamoto to kidnapping with intent to cause injury or subject someone to sexual offenses, unlawful trafficking of methamphetamine to a minor, second-degree robbery and credit card theft in the Oct. 2, 2004, incident.
He faces a maximum term of 20 years to life with parole when sentenced March 6.
Myklebust maintains he caused the girl some injury but said he did not sexually assault her. "I didn't rape her, and I didn't have plans to rape her," he told the court yesterday.
Defense attorney Keith Shigetomi said later that Myklebust admitted that he made a mistake by giving the girl methamphetamine and withdrawing money from her account using her bank card without permission. But he contends that any sex that occurred between the two was consensual.
Prosecutors say that is his view and characterized Myklebust's conduct as "forcible" rape.
"The victim suffered a great deal from this offense," Deputy Prosecutor Thalia Murphy said. She noted that this is one of the most "heinous" sexual assault cases she has ever prosecuted in the 18 years she has handled sex assaults "because of the force used and because of him injecting her with crystal meth intravenously."
The state reached a deal with Myklebust after discussing it with the victim and obtaining her approval to spare her from having to testify and relive what happened, Murphy said. The girl was severely traumatized from the attack and was terrified at having to face her attacker, prosecutors said.
At the time, the girl was a senior in high school and working two jobs to save money to go to college, Murphy said. "She was a really good kid, and this had to happen to her."
Early that morning, the girl was just steps away from the Nuuanu dental office where she worked when Myklebust, sitting in the delivery truck, called out to her and asked her to show him on a map directions to School Street.
"She was disarmed by the fact that it was a Big Brothers donation truck, and she thought it was safe," Murphy said.
But as the girl stepped into the truck, Myklebust took off with her inside. He drove to an area between Waialae and Hawaii Kai where he repeatedly sexually assaulted her inside the truck and also injected her with "ice" on two occasions, Murphy said.
According to court records, the girl told a grand jury that she tried to fight him off, but he threatened to knock her out and have his way with her. She said she thought he would kill her later and dump her body somewhere, so she submitted when he started strangling her.
She also said she thought she had been poisoned and was going to die after he injected her twice in the arm. When she asked him what he had injected in her, he told her it was "ice," according to court records.
Myklebust has a federal burglary conviction, exposing him to a six-year, eight-month mandatory minimum term as a repeat offender.
Under the plea agreement, prosecutors agreed to drop the first- and third-degree sexual assault charges and a second kidnapping charge in exchange for his guilty pleas to the remaining felony charges and agreeing to the 20-year term.
By pleading to the kidnapping charge, Myklebust will have to register as a sex offender for life and must undergo sex offender treatment, which has the same result of being convicted of the first-degree sexual assault offenses.
Shigetomi said his client was prepared to go to trial because he strongly maintained he did not sexually assault the girl. Myklebust's mother, Terri, said her son is a drug addict but not a rapist.
Myklebust has already spent two years in prison while awaiting trial.
The state has agreed not to seek consecutive or extended terms at sentencing, but expects to ask the Hawaii Paroling Authority to order Myklebust to serve the maximum 20 years.