MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — It only took about 20 minutes of deliberation for a jury to find Joseph Baltimore not guilty of second-degree sexual assault on Thursday.
The 41-year-old and several of the people watching the trial and supporting him, as many as 10 at once over the three-day trial, started crying after the verdict was read. Those supporting him included family members and friends.
Baltimore, a former WVU philosophy professor, testified on Wednesday the sexual contact between him his accuser was entirely consensual and he flatly denied the incident alleged by the victim that led to this week’s trial. On Tuesday, the victim said she woke up to Baltimore digitally assaulting her and denied any consensual sexual encounter with him.
The Dominion Post does not typically name the victims or alleged victims of sexual crimes.
“I think it was a very fair outcome,” Joseph Spano, defense attorney, said. “We put on a great defense and I think the right justice was served today.”
DNA evidence showed the accuser’s DNA on both of Baltimore’s middle fingers. Spano said that did not match her testimony that he was face-to-face with her, with multiple fingers inside her. The layout of the bed simply didn’t allow that to be plausible.
Baltimore testified the two “messed around” on Aug. 3, 2017, when the alleged incident occurred, but said they did not have sex. Spano said the DNA supported his client’s version of events.
Spano also pointed to inconsistencies between five statements given by the accuser, largely focusing on when the accuser went to bed and if she talked to Baltimore at Big Times, a bar on High Street, earlier in the night. Multiple witnesses said they saw the two talking at the bar.
Perri DeChristopher, Monongalia County prosecutor, said the accuser had been consistent about what happened in far more than five statements. The accuser told her friend, Courtney Wright, that she woke up with Baltimore’s fingers in her, just minutes after the alleged incident, DeChristopher said. The accuser also told multiple police and a Title IX investigator from WVU the same thing.
Judge Susan Tucker presided over the case in Monongalia County Circuit Court.
Story by William Dean