Jury gets case

By CHERY SABOL

Berosik, 39, is accused of sex crimes

The Daily Inter Lake

A Flathead County jury was deliberating Thursday night in the felony sex-crimes trial of Darwin Berosik.

Berosik, 39, was accused of sexual activities with three teenage girls from 2000 to 2005.

His attorney, Lane Bennett, told the jury Thursday that the case "has been a witch hunt."

But Tim Wenz and Tammi Fisher, deputy county attorneys, built the case around the girls' allegations that Berosik blackmailed them into having sex. If they refused, he would cause them trouble, they said.

Bennett said the girls' stories were inconsistent through a series of retelling them. It isn't a matter of quibbling about details, he said.

"They are critical elements of the crimes" Berosik was accused of committing, he said.

There wasn't enough evidence to convict Berosik, Bennett said.

"You need more. You don't have it," he told the jury. The case "is replete with reasonable doubt."

Fisher disagreed.

"Don't be fooled by the smokescreens" Berosik put up, she said.

The girls "look to you for justice," she told the jury.

They said that Berosik had sex with one girl in her home and the other two in his tractor trailer.

Some of his testimony corroborated the girls', Fisher said.

Alleged victims of sex crimes are not identified without permission in The Daily Inter Lake.

Jury members received the case late Thursday afternoon and still were deliberating at press time.

The case was heard in the court of District Judge Stewart Stadler.