A 17-year-old Bingham High student said Thursday and Friday that he was sexually abused by his former science teacher three years ago at the teacher's home.
But a defense attorney for the former Oquirrh Hills Middle School teacher said the molestation never occurred but was fabricated because of religious conflicts and family problems.The boy testified that Demar W. Nilson, 52, became the father that he never had. He accompanied his teacher on camping trips and motorcycle rides and helped him build sheds, paint fences and work on other projects.
One night between February and April 1989, he said he was at Nilson's West Jordan home, 1370 Countrywood Lane, watching movies with Nilson and his family. Because it was late, he called his mother and got permission to stay the night.
"He wanted me to sleep in his bed," the youth, who was then 14, testified. The boy said he got into bed still wearing his pants, but Nilson told him to take them off so he would be more comfortable. The boy said he fell asleep but was awakened by Nilson fondling him.
"I remember somebody reaching inside my underwear," he told the 3rd District Court jury.
He said he rolled over and went back to sleep because he was too afraid to do anything else. The next morning, he said, Nilson put his arm around him and told him he loved him.
"I decided he just couldn't have done it because I didn't want to believe it," the boy said. "He was a really good friend and almost like my dad, and I didn't think he would hurt me that way."
Deputy Salt Lake County Attorney Rod Ybarra said the boy became so distraught over the incident that he tried to commit suicide several times. He said Nilson had gone out of his way to help the boy, but then the relationship "became perverted."
But defense attorney Jo Carol Nesset-Sale told the five-woman, three-man jury that Nilson never sexually abused the boy - a charge that is "easily made and hard to defend." He didn't report the incident for more than a year, after repeatedly denying to his bishop, therapist and to police that it had ever occurred.
Nesset-Sale said the boy's mother and LDS Church leaders became upset because Nilson took the boy to the Good Shepherd Lutheran Church and had - at his request - shown him the anti-Mormon movie, "The Godmakers."
The teenager said he was planning to join the Lutheran church, but his mother forbade him from returning to the church and ordered him not to have any further contact with Nilson. Nesset-Sale said the boy's LDS bishop also contacted Nilson and the school principal, who met with Nilson and told him not to take the boy to the Lutheran church.
"It was a devastating time for this young man," Nesset-Sale said. "He was very angry at his mother for cutting him off."
Under cross-examination, the boy said he attempted suicide three times in a two-week period because he had lost two parts of his life he felt good about - a new church and his new family, the Nilsons. Earlier, however, he said he cut his wrists and tried to hang himself because he was depressed over the abuse.
After confiding in friends and church leaders, he eventually told sheriff's investigators about the incident. A charge of forcible sexual abuse, a second-degree felony, was filed in October 1991.
Nesset-Sale asked for a mistrial Thursday afternoon after the boy once mentioned the word "convicted" when referring to Nilson. Nilson pleaded no contest to sexually abusing a boy in Davis County while he was teaching there in 1981. The case was later expunged and he was hired as a teacher in the Jordan School District three years later.
Judge John Rokich took the motion for a mistrial under advisement and, outside the presence of the jury, cautioned the boy not to mention the word "convicted" or mention any prior sexual abuse involving Nilson.
The jury is expected to deliberate Nilson's fate Tuesday.