Robert Melia
Jr., 42, who was suspended from his patrol job after his arrest in April 2008,
sat in Superior Court in Mount Holly and scribbled continuously on a notepad as
Assistant Burlington County Prosecutor Kevin Morgan gave sordid details of how
Melia allegedly videotaped a blindfolded and bound girl being repeatedly
violated with objects.
"Perhaps
the most crucial piece of evidence was the video," Morgan told the jury,
adding that the girl appeared to have been drugged.
Melia's
girlfriend, Heather Lewis, whom the prosecution identified as the adult woman
on the tape, is accused of assaulting the minor and forcing her to be her
sexual partner.
Melia's lawyer,
Mark Catanzaro of Moorestown, said the girl appeared to be an adult and had
consented to the sex act. There was no evidence Melia was even present at the
taping, he said.
The two other
girls Melia and Lewis allegedly assaulted lied to police to deflect criticism
about themselves and their troubled families, Catanzaro said.
"They
conjured up a story," he said.
Testimony
before Judge Charles Delehey began after opening arguments, with some jurors
looking away when the discussion became graphic.
Morgan warned
the panel they would need to see explicit photographs and the 35-minute video
police extracted from Melia's computer.
"I
apologize for the disturbing material," he said.
Lewis, 36, of
Pemberton, took the girls to Melia's home in Moorestown to be
"exploited" for the couple's "sexual amusement and
enjoyment," Morgan said. Police were notified after one of the girls told
her stepfather.
The first
witness to testify was one of the alleged victims. She said she occasionally
visited Melia's house to babysit Lewis' son from a previous relationship. The
child is her cousin, said the woman, who is now 23.
"I would
go there to play with him, babysit him. He was attached to me. I spent a lot of
time there," she said.
But one night
she awoke in the house to find Lewis sexually assaulting her, she testified.
When she tried to move away, Melia held her back, she said.
Police said
that during a search of Melia's home on Cottage Avenue, they also discovered
video of Melia engaged in sexual acts with calves on a Burlington County farm.
He was charged with animal cruelty, but a judge dismissed the counts in 2009,
saying there was no evidence the animals had been tormented by the acts.
Melia and Lewis
are standing trial on more than 40 counts each of aggravated sexual assault,
sexual contact, endangering the welfare of a minor, invasion of privacy, and
other charges related to the teen
When the girls
gave statements to police in April 2008, they said the incidents had begun in
2000. They had difficulty pinning down exact dates or how old they were.
The girls, two
of whom are sisters, said they were between 12 and 17 when they were assaulted,
separately, by Melia and Lewis. They told police the couple used vibrators on
them and forced them to engage in sex acts with the adults.
The charges
carry prison sentences in excess of 52 years for each defendant, the prosecutor
said. Melia also is charged with official police misconduct, and Lewis faces
charges for allegedly sexually assaulting a 14-year-old boy and forcing him to
have sex with one of the girls.
Lewis' public
defender, Bonnie Geller-Gorman, said her client was not "the monster"
the prosecutor portrayed her to be.
Before she moved
in with Melia, Lewis lived with the uncle of the two sisters. Lewis and that
man had a baby and she often invited the girls to Melia's house to babysit or
to visit their cousin, the lawyer said.
She knew the
third girl through family and neighborhood ties in Pemberton, Geller-Gorman
said. When Lewis learned the girl had been impregnated by her stepfather, she
suggested the girl notify police, Geller-Gorman said. Instead, the girl
concocted a story about being assaulted by Lewis and Melia, the lawyer said.
"It's all
lies to protect her stepfather," Geller-Gorman said.
Lewis and Melia
were jailed after their arrests, then released on bail. Their trial is expected
to last up to three weeks.