84 year old sex offender heads back to prison
Repeat sex offender Bobby Otto Powers is headed back to prison, almost nine years after being released early because corrections officials concluded he was dying.
At 84, he will be one of the state's oldest inmates.
A jury in February found Powers guilty of four counts of sexual battery for licking a sales clerk's hand inside Hustler Hollywood in Oklahoma City then groping her a few days later in 2017.
Jurors chose five years on each count as punishment. Oklahoma County District Judge Cindy Truong ordered him to serve the time back to back to back to back — for a total of 20 years. He was still in jail Sunday awaiting transport to the state Corrections Department reception center in Lexington.
The retired schoolteacher first went to prison in 2005 to serve a 60-year sentence for child molestation. He served less than five.
The Pardon and Parole Board voted 4-0 in April 2010 to release him immediately after being told corrections officials had documented he was ill and dying."They indicate his prognosis is terminal in from six months to a year," a board investigator reported.Brad Henry, then governor, signed off on the medical commutation, and Powers was released May 12, 2010.
By 2017, Powers had become a regular at Hustler Hollywood, which sells adult novelty items and lingerie. He visited two to three times a week, spending most of his time looking over the pornographic movies, according to testimony at his trial.
He groped the sales clerk 30 minutes before closing time Nov. 30, 2017, approaching her from behind as she was cleaning, according to testimony. He offered her a $10 bill, then grabbed her in three places after she tried to explain there was a policy against taking tips.
"It seemed really surreal," the victim testified at the trial. "One second, I'm sweeping. And the next minute, I'm being molested . ... I could not get away."
She told jurors he pointed to red Christmas lingerie as he walked away and said to her he would love to see her in some. He was arrested in December 2017.
Powers lived in Oklahoma City with his wife. He did not testify at his trial last month. In a recorded jail call, he told his son he was sorry, that he had learned his lesson and that he was going to straighten out now for sure.
"It's not too late, is it?" he asked.
For prosecutors, his case has become an example of the possible negative consequences of the current legislative efforts to release offenders early to reduce the state's prison population. Because of his medical commutation, Powers was not supervised after he got out of prison in 2010.
Only 21 inmates now locked up in state Corrections Department facilities are 80 or older, a spokesman said last week.