Shawna Conn Child Sex Case - Updated

(Portage County, Ohio) Nineteen-year-old Shawna A. Conn is in the news again.

A 19-year-old, female registered sex offender was ordered to serve 180 days in the Portage County jail — with credit for time served since her August 2009 arrest — and placed on five years’ probation for having sexual contact with an 11-year-old boy in June 2009.

However, Portage County Common Pleas Judge Laurie Pittman was faced Monday with a difficult question: Where to put Shawna A. Conn, convicted of having sexual contact with an 11-year-old boy last summer, where she can have no contact with children and live by the terms of her sex offender registration?

Conn, who cannot live with relatives when children are present, has the mental capacity of a 10- or 11-year-old, according to her attorney.

The former Shalersville resident pleaded guilty in January to one count of gross sexual imposition, a fourth-degree felony. She had already been labeled a Tier I sexual offender by a Trumbull County court at the time of the Portage County offense, based on a prior conviction.

Beside the jail term, Pittman ordered Conn to serve 12 months on intensive supervised probation and 48 months on standard probation. She will be labeled a Tier II sexual offender based on the new conviction, meaning she will have to verify her address with the sheriff’s office in her county of residence every 180 days for 25 years.

Conn had faced a maximum prison term of 18 months, but the Portage County Prosecutor’s Office had agreed not to oppose probation at sentencing as long as Conn received counseling.

The Conn case is obviously a nettlesome problem for the prosecutors and the court. Judge Pittman has already expressed concern that Conn will re-offend once released.

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Ohio Woman Guilty of Repeat Child Sex Offense
[Previous 1/6/10 post]
(Portage County, Ohio) In April 2009, 18-year-old Shawna A. Conn was sentenced in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court to 60 days in jail for engaging in sex with two minor boys in 2008.

Judge Peter Kontos suspended the jail sentence and ordered Conn to serve two years of probation and to register as a Tier I sex offender.

In October 2009, Shawna Conn (aka Stephanie Conn) was arrested in Portage County for allegedly engaging in sex with an 11-year-old boy in June 2009. On Monday of this week, Conn, now 19, pleaded guilty to one count of gross sexual imposition.

Conn originally was charged with a third-degree felony, which was amended to a fourth-degree felony as part of the plea deal.

In the June 6, 2009 incident, Conn allegedly had sexual contact with the boy, who was not related to her, according to Sheriff David Doak. At the time, Doak would not say how she knew the boy.

Judge Laurie Pittman ordered a pre-sentence investigation and specified that Conn's sex offender classification would be bumped from Tier I to Tier II. A sentencing date wasn't disclosed.