Nate Webster says sex with teen was legal

Former Bengal Nathaniel “Nate” Webster, Jr., had sex with a teen girl, his attorney told jurors Tuesday, but she was 16, not 15 as prosecutors allege.

The correct age could mean the difference between Webster’s freedom and more than 30 years in prison.

“Something immoral takes place between Nate and” the girl, Gregory Samms, one of Webster’s attorneys told jurors. “When it happens, she’s 16 ... and it is consensual.”

In Ohio, except in rare specific instances, the age of consent is 16. Webster is accused of having sex with the girl when she was 15 – and he tells police that on a recording. But his attorneys said Tuesday that Webster’s recorded recollection was wrong.

Webster, now 34, is accused of sexual battery, gross sexual imposition (sexual touching) and five counts of unlawful sexual conduct with a minor.
Webster was 31 in 2009 when he was accused of having sex with the 15-year-old girl who prosecutors said used to babysit for Webster.

“He knew her when she was a kid, 10 or 11 years old,” Assistant Hamilton County Prosecutor Seth Tieger told the eight-woman, four-man jury.

Webster was chided by the girl’s father, Tieger said, for not paying her for babysitting. When he did, he started the sexual relationship, the prosecutor added, and threatened to kill her and her family if she told. “As time went by this became a full-fledged secretive relationship,” Tieger said.

Eventually, they often had sex in Webster’s car, with heavily tinted windows, in Webster’s Symmes Township home or in a nearby park.

The girl finally told her parents. They contacted police who put a wire on her and had her talk to Webster. On those recorded conversations, Tieger said Webster admitted having sex with the girl when she was 15.

After Webster’s arrest last year, he “repeatedly denied any sexual relationship” with the girl – until police played for him the secretly recorded conversations with the girl. Then, “he confessed,” Tieger said.

But in court Tuesday, Samms insisted Webster had sex with the girl when she was 16 and made it clear Webster’s defense was to attack the girl.
This is a “story of a troubled young girl, so troubled that she doesn’t want to live in her own home,” Samms said, adding the girl often partied at Webster’s home by drinking and smoking marijuana, often supplied by Webster.

Injuries limited Webster’s Bengals career to a few games after he signed a five-year, $11.3 million contract. Coach Marvin Lewis once compared him to All-Pro linebacker Ray Lewis.

Ray Lewis, who played college football at the University of Miami as did Webster, has been subpoenaed to testify in the case. Mary Jill Donovan said Ray Lewis is expected to testify later this week.


(cincinnati.com)