Price man sentenced after no-contest plea
A Price man who was alleged to have committed sex abuse against children along with two other people was sentenced to five years in the Utah State Prison after he pleaded "no contest" on Monday.
Timothy Lee Romano, 25, made the plea concerning two charges of third-degree felony attempted sex abuse of a child. He did that in an agreement with prosecutors to keep himself from having to possibly spend the rest of his life in prison.
After the plea, Judge George Harmond, of the 7th District Court, sentenced him to the five year term for each offense, but noted that they would run concurrently.
The crime allegedly involved six children in almost all age brackets that took place over three years.
Also charged in the crimes were Romano's wife, Amanda Nicole and Tyler James Barney, who is a friend of the pair.
Amanda Romano has waived her right to a preliminary hearing and is going back to court on March 25. She is charged with five counts of object rape of a child and four counts of aggravated sexual abuse of a child. These are all first-degree felonies.
Barney, it is planned, will come to trial in May for two counts of sex abuse of a child (second degree felonies).
Price Police Capt. Bill Barnes said after the arrest in December 2012 that the charges stemmed from an investigation by Detective Ed Malmgren. Malmgren had been contacted in late October by investigators from the state Division of Child and Family Services, who had been tipped off by a citizen.
"In 28-and-a-half years of police work, this is as troubling as anything I've seen," Barnes said at the time. Malmgren said he was equally shaken by the findings of his investigation.
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