By DAMIEN FISHER, InDepthNH.org
CONCORD — The first criminal trial of a Sununu Youth Development Center abuse suspect ended with a hung jury on Tuesday, delaying justice again for the victim.
Merrimack Superior Court Judge Daniel St. Hilaire dismissed jurors Tuesday afternoon after they twice reported they were unable to reach a unanimous verdict on any of the 12 aggravated felonious sexual assault charges against former YDC staffer Victor Malavet.
Malavet, 62, of Gilford, remains free pending another trial in the case, likely a certainty. Malavet is one of nine men who face trial for allegedly abusing children kept in custody in the state’s youth detention system.
He is accused of raping Natasha Maunsell in 2001 starting when she was a 15-year-old detainee in the Youth Detention Services Unit in Concord where he worked. Maunsell appeared in the courthouse throughout the jury deliberations, waiting for a verdict that now is not going to come.
The jury got the case on Thursday afternoon, and deliberated for a total of about three hours before one of the women on the jury went home sick. She was replaced by a male alternate juror. The new jury of five men and seven women restarted deliberations on Friday and reconvened Tuesday.
The jury worked through the morning, but by early afternoon informed St. Hilaire they were deadlocked. The judge instructed the jury to continue deliberations, but after a couple of hours they reported a second time they could not reach a decision.
St. Hilaire declared a mistrial in the case, requiring the state to bring a new trial if it plans to continue to seek a conviction. New Hampshire Attorney John Formella expressed disappointment in Tuesday’s outcome in a statement released shortly after the mistrial was declared.
“While today’s result is disappointing, I want to extend my heartfelt thanks to the trial team for their integrity and dedication. We are grateful for their relentless effort, professionalism, and commitment to justice throughout this difficult case. We remain committed to supporting victims and continuing our efforts to address and prosecute abuse,” Formella said.
Maunsell left the courthouse soon after the jury announced and St. Hilaire declared the mistrial. During her testimony on the stand last week, Maunsell told jurors harrowing and graphic details about being groomed and then raped by Malavet, backed up by corroborating witnesses.
But the defense made issue of her civil lawsuit against the state, claiming she was using the criminal trial to bolster her civil case and increase her eventual payout. Maunsell maintained throughout that she was telling the truth about the abuse.
Malavet’s team declined to comment when they left the courtroom Tuesday, as did prosecutors.
The state is currently fighting two separate YDC legal battles on opposing sides. In the criminal cases, the state is trying to prosecute many of the same alleged abusers named in hundreds of civil lawsuits where the state is the defendant.
Adult survivors of the YDC system started coming forward in the late 2010s, telling their stories of being physically and sexually abused. The civil lawsuits claim the abusive staffers were protected by an at-best callous and incompetent state system that was indifferent to child rape.
Former New Hampshire Attorney General Gordon MacDonald formed the YDC Task Force in 2019 to investigate and prosecute the alleged abusers. But, the task force resulted in just 11 arrests compared to the hundreds of named abusers in the lawsuits. There have been no new arrests since 2021, and since that time one of the suspects has died, and another declared incompetent to stand trial due to age-related dementia.
The first civil trial in the YDC scandal, held earlier this year, resulted in a jury award of $38 million for the victim, David Meehan. That jury found the state liable for the abuse. The state is challenging the amount of the award.
