A domestic violence victim wants charges dropped against her boyfriend — who is alleged to have held her against her will, beaten, choked and threatened her with a knife.
The attorney for the boyfriend, Matt Stone, told the court last week the victim could be expected to appear at some point to continue pressing her request for dismissal. Currently, the boyfriend, 24-year-old Justin Rogers, is set to go on trial during the week of Aug. 19 and will make a final pre-trial appearance Aug. 15.
When Rogers was arrested for attacking the woman, he was ordered to have no contact with her. The girlfriend appeared during a court session in March to make a direct appeal to have the no contact order lifted, but was turned down by Circuit Judge Gordon Webb.
She appeared again in mid-June telling the court she wanted to renew her request to lift the no contact order so she and her attacker could reunite. The court granted the second request.
Stone told the court the couple “has had a couple of good months together since the no contact order was lifted,” and the woman did not want the case against her boyfriend prosecuted.
At the time of the alleged attack, the girlfriend was pregnant with Rogers’ child, according to court records. The incident came to light when the victim approached a Baxter County deputy sheriff on routine patrol just after 2 a.m. on Oct. 31 last year.
She told the deputy she and her children had been at Rogers’ home when he is alleged to have become agitated and shoved her against a wall.
The victim said while she was packing her belongings in an attempt to leave the residence, Rogers went into the kitchen and emerged carrying a large butcher’s knife. She reported Rogers started walking toward her, saying, “I’m going to kill it,” in reference to the couple’s unborn baby.
She said she was able to grab Rogers’ hand and deflect the knife from her body. She said she had also been somewhat successful in calming Rogers down.
An one point during the altercation, Rogers is alleged to have followed the victim into a bedroom, grabbed her by the throat, punched her in the face and took her cellphone. He is reported to have threatened, “You are going to die tonight.”
According to the probable cause affidavit, Rogers choked the victim until she passed out. She told investigators she remembered seeing a clock in the bedroom just before losing consciousness. It read 12:56 a.m., and she said when she awoke, it was 1:15 a.m.
The woman said when she came to, Rogers attempted to apologize for the incident, but she told him she was leaving. She said initially Rogers would not let her exit the bedroom. She waited until he fell asleep, slipped out with her children, saw the deputy and reported what had happened.
Rogers is charged with aggravated assault on a family member, second-degree domestic battery, first-degree false imprisonment and interfering with an emergency communications device.
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