75-year-old man sentenced to 35 years for raping minor

Trevor J. Mitchell | Argus Leader

A 75-year-old man was sentenced to 35 years in prison today after pleading guilty to the first-degree rape of a juvenile family member.

Verlyn Julius was arrested in 2017 after the child, now 12, told a school counselor that Julius had touched her inappropriately.

In court, prosecutor Lori Ehlers said that although Julius was of an advanced age and suffering from several medical conditions, "there needs to be a statement to him and his community" expressed through his sentence.

In the plea deal, a cap of 35 years had been agreed on, although Ehlers said of the potential life sentence Julius could have been facing that "if he could serve it all, it would be less time than the children he's victimized."

Julius had been on parole following a guilty plea to abuse or cruelty to a minor — a charge that had been reduced from sexual contact with a minor in a 2014 court case. The minor in that case was also related to Julius.

In initial police interviews regarding the 2017 case, Ehlers said, Julius had attempted to avoid blame and responsibility, claiming that the victim had been the one to initiate the contact.

Ehlers also read a letter from Julius' wife — a letter she said she'd "written and rewritten a thousand times."

"It fills me with levels of anger I cannot believe," she wrote.

"The person I chose to share my life with destroyed our life."

Defense attorney Melissa Fiksdal said that Julius, who is struggling with cancer and other medical issues, "simply wants an opportunity to spend his last remaining days out of custody," hoping for the minimum 15-year sentence.

Judge Jon Sogn, calling Julius' acts "a despicable crime," and "an unimaginable violation of a child's trust," sentenced him to 35 years in prison.

When asked if he'd like to make a statement to the court, Julius simply said, "I'd just like to tell my wife I'm sorry."