Affidavit reveals lurid details of former DA’s office advances

Trial set for July 18

Former Seventh Judicial District attorney Myrl Serra is heading to trial in July to face charges of sexual misconduct with three former employees.

Mesa County judge David Bottger set the date after a preliminary hearing February 11 that was reported in the Montrose Daily Press and the Denver Post to be filled with lurid accounts from an employee of the district attorney’s office who formerly worked under Serra, and attempts by the defense to discredit her story.
One of the employees was reportedly at the preliminary hearing, acting nervously in the witness chair as Serra sat calmly in the courtroom.
The hearing came just after the affidavit detailing Serra’s alleged abuse was released to the public. The investigations that followed Serra’s September arrest revealed a staff of women held “hostage” by the sexual advances of the former prosecutor.
Three of the women working in the district attorney’s Montrose office reported chargeable offenses. One of the three reportedly took the stand at the hearing and told the court Serra had exposed himself to her 25 to 35 times in the previous two years, all the while he was demanding sexual favors in his office.
The affidavit tells the story of a married woman who thought she was “going to hell” for following through on Serra’s advances, even though she insisted that she never wanted a sexual relationship with her boss. The affidavit said she never told her husband.
In the affidavit, one investigator wrote of an encounter he had with a woman at the Seventh Judicial District’s Office in Delta who was afraid to talk in the office of her confrontation with Serra.
In the affidavit, the investigator wrote, “She told me that Serra is vindictive and if he found out that she had spoken to me about his actions that she would be fired from her job and there was nothing anyone could do to stop Serra from saying that her firing was due to poor work performance.”
Serra, who was appointed district attorney in 2006, was arrested by the Colorado Bureau of Investigation September 30 on suspicion of official misconduct, indecent exposure and unlawful sexual contact.
Since then, the charges against him have been amended to include one felony count of both unlawful sexual contact and criminal extortion. He is also facing one count of misdemeanor official misconduct, three misdemeanor counts of indecent exposure and a misdemeanor count of indecent exposure. After he was caught staring at one of the office’s employees at a store in Montrose, in violation of a restraining order, Serra was arrested again in December.
That was a felony violation of Serra’s bail bond, which required he avoid contact with any of the witnesses in the case against him. There’s a preliminary hearing for that charge set for April 1.
The charges that Serra will face at trial in July include felony counts of unlawful sexual contact and criminal extortion.
After Serra’s initial arrest, the district attorney’s office was put in the hands of the state attorney general’s office; later former Montrose attorney Dan Hotsenpiller took over the post starting January 10.
The Seventh Judicial District covers Gunnison, Montrose, Delta, Hinsdale, San Miguel and Ouray counties.
Since Serra’s arrest, interesting details have come out about his past, including his stint as a collegiate, and then professional, bowler. He was also named as a “Worst Boss” in 2010 on aol.com.
Serra, who has pleaded not guilty to all charges, will go to trial in Montrose on July 18.
To view the affidavit, visit www.lawweekonline.com/2010/11/cour-documents-show-serras-alleged-abuse-on-employees/.