Havre man pleads guilty to incest with girl, arrested immediately

A Havre man who admitted to incest with a young relative was arrested immediately after his hearing Wednesday afternoon in District Court.

Theodore Slate admitted to having sexual contact with a gradeschool-aged relative and was taken to the Hill County Detention Center, where he is being held without bail.

District Court Judge Greg Pinski from Great Falls, who presided over the change of plea hearing via video, said 70-year-old Slate's offense is too serious and the minimum sentence - 25 years before a chance at parole - too grave to not arrest him.

Slate's public defender, Kaydee Snipes Ruiz, argued that Slate had been keeping in touch and showing up to her office frequently since the charges were pressed. The man is not a flight risk and he is not a danger to anyone, especially since he no longer lives around any minors, Snipes Ruiz said.

Assistant Attorney General Mary Cochenour, who also attended via video, objected that Slate is guaranteed to stay in place.

"He's facing 100 years, and no parole for 25 years, which would be essentially the rest of his life," Cochenour said.

Cochenour said Slate has, in the past, had federal agents looking for him for charges in other cases.

"He'll be held without bail," Pinski said, citing the extreme seriousness of the charge and his potential danger to the community.

Slate's offenses were reported May 17, when a woman told the Hill County Sheriff's Office he had molested a relative. The victim told the woman that Slate had showed his genitalia and asked her to touch him in various sexual ways, which the girl said she did.

After this, the woman said, the girl and her brother were sent to live with Slate's family in Colorado.

Colorado Palisade Police Department officers conducted a forensic interview with the girl June 10. The girl told officers that Slate masturbated in front of her in different ways, and showed her pornographic videos, and that the incidents happened in Havre and Colorado Springs.

Slate agreed July 3 to a recorded interview with a Hill County sherrif's deputy. During the July interview Slate talked of several other instances in which he and the girl had sexual contact.