Two men facing sex crime charges in Johnson County courts had the charges against them dismissed.
Alexander J. Peacock, 22, of Indianapolis, was charged with two counts of rape, both Level 3 felonies, in July 2020. A female relative had accused him of sexual assaulting her twice in 2019, according to court documents.
On Oct. 20, Johnson County Superior Court 2 Judge Peter Nugent granted Peacock’s attorney’s motion to exclude the testimony of his accuser, said Brandon Robinson, a deputy prosecutor with the Johnson County Prosecutor’s Office. Four days later, prosecutors filed a motion to dismiss the charges, and they were dismissed the same day, according to online court records.
A representative of the relative was served with subpoenas for the victim to appear on at least two different dates in 2021, however, the relative did not appear. Peacock’s attorney moved to exclude the relative’s testimony, which is customary when a witness fails to appear for a deposition more than once, Robinson said.
“Unfortunately, without testimony from the complaining witness, the state obviously was … unable to prove this case,” he said.
In an unrelated case, a Franklin man also saw charges dismissed in October, though for a different reason.
Clinton J. Arthur, 29, was facing a single charge of voyeurism, a Level 6 felony, when his case was dismissed by Johnson County Superior Court 3 judge Douglas Cummins on Oct. 19. He was originally charged in July after a woman told police he placed a camera in a bathroom shared by her and her teenage child, according to court documents.
A motion was filed by prosecutors to dismiss the case in September after both the woman and the teen came forward and said it was a misunderstanding. The camera was in a non-recording status in a bathroom that was shared with Arthur, and the woman watched the recordings on the camera and saw no nude images of the teen, Robinson said.
The woman told prosecutors she wanted them to dismiss the case and believed Arthur was not guilty of the charge. Additionally, neither the camera nor the footage were recovered by police, meaning there was no physical evidence to prove any criminal charge, Robinson said.
While charges were dismissed in this case, Arthur did plead guilty in two unrelated cases, said Joe Villanueva, prosecutor.
On Dec. 21, 2021, Arthur was charged with operating a vehicle after being a habitual traffic offender, a Level 6 felony. He pled guilty and was sentenced to 365 days in jail, with 311 days suspended to probation on Sept. 29 in Johnson County Superior Court 3. He also received a 27-day jail credit, according to online court records.
Several months earlier, on April 26, 2021, Arthur was charged with the same crime. He plead guilty and was sentenced to 365 days in jail, all suspended to probation, on Sept. 29 in Johnson County Superior Court 3. This sentence was ordered to be served right after the sentence in the other case, online court records show.
