Appeals court upholds Kokomo man's child molest conviction

May 7—The child molestation conviction of a Kokomo man has been upheld by the state's appellate court.

The Indiana Court of Appeals, in an unanimous decision issued April 29, upheld the conviction of Robert Nathaniel Farmer of Kokomo.

Farmer was found guilty of child molestation by a jury last year and sentenced to 50 years in prison, 49 of which is executed.

According to court documents and trial testimony, Farmer molested the female victim multiple times over a handful of years, starting when the girl was 4 or 5 years old.

The victim testified Farmer usually sexually abused her at night when her mother was working overnight shifts and when he was drunk.

Farmer maintained his innocence through the trial and sentencing.

His attorney argued in court that the victim made up the sexual abuse stories because her parents were angry with her after it had been discovered she was sexually active with her boyfriend.

The court, in an opinion penned by Chief Judge Robert Altice, rebutted each of Farmer and his lawyer, Brent Dechert's, main arguments.

Farmer, in his appeal, argued the trial court judge, Howard County Superior Court 4 Judge Hans Pate, erred when he denied Farmer's motion to dismiss the charging information due to it not being specific enough and erred when he allow the admission of a videotaped forensic interview of the victim and several statements the victim made to family members.

In the appeal, Farmer characterizes the context around how the allegations came about as "certainly suspect" and her testimony itself was contradictory to past statements and "so unbelievable" it was "incredibly dubious."

"(She) did not just wake up one day and decide it was time to report the alleged molestation," the appeal states. "It was not until she was caught having sexual relations with her boyfriend and then threatened by her father and stepmother to be taken to the hospital for examination did she state that she was molested by Farmer ... (She) went very quickly from being the accused teenager, sure to lose her telephone and social media privileges, to the victim that everyone would feel sorry for."

The Court of Appeals, though, did not find the victim's testimony as contradictory. Instead, the court said, her testimony and its claims were coherent and there was at least some circumstantial evidence corroborating her claims. That included testimony from family members that said they observed bruising on the girl's legs that were caused by the abuse, that she was treated for a urinary tract infection at the age of 7 and that family members testified she was fearful of Farmer and did not want to be around him.

"... courts have recognized inconsistencies between pretrial statements and trial testimony do not necessarily render testimony incredibly dubious," the appeals court wrote.

Farmer also argued the state did not present sufficient evidence to convict him and that since Pate initially did not classify Farmer as a credit restricted felon during sentencing, the fact Pate amended that later should not have been allowed.

As a credit restricted felon, Farmer earns "good time credit" at a lesser rate than if he wasn't designed as credit restricted. The designation is usually reserved for those convicted of more serious crimes, such as murder and child molestation.

The appeals court had no issue with the amended sentence, though it did order Pate to formally advise Farmer of the consequences of him being a credit restricted felon.

Tyler Juranovich can be reached at 765-454-8577, by email at tyler.juranovich@kokomotribune.com or on Twitter at @tylerjuranovich.