Sex offender receives 20-year prison term

The Daily Inter Lake

A Kalispell man who went on the run to avoid prosecution for sex crimes against a young girl was sentenced Thursday to 20 years at Montana State Prison with 13 years suspended.

Flathead County District Court Judge Ted Lympus also ordered 52-year-old Keith Mathias Mordja to serve the first five years of his sentence without the possibility of parole.

According to court records, Mordja had sex with a young girl about 150 times over a period of four years. She was 12 to 16 years old at the time.

Mordja, who was charged with molesting the girl in January 2007, had been freed from jail in February 2007 after his $100,000 bail amount was cut in half during a bond hearing.

But Mordja jumped bail prior to an August 2008 attorney's conference just days before his trial in District Court. He was arrested in September 2008 after a two-hour standoff with authorities in Colorado.

He was taken into custody after U.S. marshals raided his sister's Centennial, Colo., home, where family members had attempted to hide him.

Prosecutors dropped the bail-jumping charges in exchange for his guilty plea in December 2008 to sexual intercourse without consent, a felony.