Rape charge dismissed; man on probation

PALMER — A Meadow Lakes man accused of one of the most serious crimes on the books was essentially exonerated Monday.

Carl Brattain, 34, saw his case drop from a very serious felony charge of sexual assault — which is classified in the category of assaults that also includes murder — all the way down to a misdemeanor criminal mischief charge. In this case for maliciously smashing a cell phone.

Brattain was arrested in September 2009 after a woman called Alaska State Troopers asking to talk about a “domestic violence issue” and saying her neck was bruised, according to an affidavit trooper investigator Curtis Vik filed with the case.

Troopers eventually talked to the woman in Anchorage, where she’d gone to get a rape exam. Her story was that she knew Brattain and the two had met up one night at a local bar. Eventually, he got a ride home from her and both wound up in his bedroom where he flew into a rage, choked her and raped her.

She said when she tried to call for help he took away her cell phone — a $150 Blackberry Pearl — threw it against the wall and later smashed it with a hammer. Vik recounted a call troopers recorded between Brattain and the woman in which Brattain made some admissions, but not to raping the woman, then asked for a face-to-face meeting. Vik also describes a conversation he personally had with Brattain that was very brief.

“Brattain advised me that he didn’t want to talk without the presence of an attorney,” Vik wrote.

Brattain’s attorney, Jon-Marc Petersen, said the woman’s story was essentially bogus. He said in this type of case, where the crime reportedly occurred in private, prosecutors and law enforcement rely, out of necessity, on one main witness — the alleged victim.

“It was all about her credibility, and she didn’t have any,” he said of Brattain’s accuser.

He said that as he investigated the case he found out that the woman had waited at least a day to report the incident. He also said that immediately following the alleged attack friends spotted her at the same bar where she’d been hanging out with Brattain. The woman was talking with friends and showing no signs that anything was wrong.

“We got her to come in and sign some affidavits, which were pretty revealing,” Petersen said, without delving into specifics.

Petersen said the criminal mischief charge netted Brattain essentially no incarceration time. The official sentence was 90 days with 90 suspended, meaning he’s only liable to spend time behind bars for this case if he commits another crime or doesn’t follow the terms of his probation.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.