Norman H. McAllister

Norman H. McAllister (born 1951) is an American politician who is a suspended member of the Vermont Senate. He represents the Alburgh-Franklin district in Northwest Vermont. He was elected to the state legislature in 2002, and suspended in 2015 after being arrested on sexual assault charges.

Legislative career

McAllister was elected to the Vermont House in 2002 and to the Senate in 2012, attracting little media attention as a legislator.^[1] In the House, McAllister sat on the Health and Human Services Committee, and was instrumental in reforming Vermont's child custody laws to make it easier for at-risk children to be placed in the custody of their relatives, rather than the state.^[2] A lifelong dairy farmer, Mcallister was one of only two senators to oppose Vermont's bill to require labeling of genetically modified food in 2014.^[3] He was appointed assistant minority leader of the Senate Republican caucus in 2014.^[4]

Criminal allegations

In May 2015, McAllister was accused of three felony counts of sexual assault and three misdemeanors of prohibited acts, the charges arising from what police describe as a sex-for-rent scheme involving several unwilling tenants.^[5] On June 1, 2015, one of the three women listed as victims in the sex crime cases was reported dead of natural causes.^[6]

McAllister initially confessed to a reporter that he had had sex with two of his accusers, but later recanted.^[1][7] According to a police affadavit, in a phone conversation to one accuser McAllister stated that "I was forcing you to do something you didn't want to do".^[1] McAllister maintained that he was innocent and that the relationships were consensual.^[1] After McAllister refused repeated calls to resign from the legislature, he was suspended by a 20-10 vote of the Senate Rules Committee, and his subsequent request for reinstatement was rejected.^[8] McAllister's family and other longtime tenant defended him, saying the allegations were false.^[1]

McAllister's case was divided into two legal trials.^[9] During the first trial, in June 2016, a woman who had worked on McAllister's farm and in his legislative office testified that McAllister forced her to perform oral sex on him and later raped her when she was 16 years old.^[10] The woman recounted that she "continually denied his advances, but he pulled her by the arm and eventually threw her over his shoulder and carried her into a bedroom."^[11] Unexpectedly, the charges against McAllister were dismissed on the second day of the trial at the request of the prosecuting state's attorney, Diane Wheeler.^[9][12] Wheeler stated that "new information" had created an "ethical dilemma" requiring the case to be dropped.^[12][13] The accuser's lawyer explained that her client had lied under oath about a "very, very minor point" unrelated to the claim that McAllister had assaulted her, and that she had advised the accuser not to continue testifying to avoid a potential charge of perjury.^[9][13] McAllister's defense team noted that the accuser's testimony had contained numerous inconsistencies, calling the accuser's credibility into question; they said Wheeler had done "the right thing" after recognizing that the prosecution would have had "a very difficult time meeting their burden."^[12] Trauma experts and victims' advocates said that it is common for trauma victims to have difficulty reconstructing details and specifics under cross-examination, and that preparing victims well for testifying is essential.^[9][13] Lawyers for both sides agreed that the decision would likely influence McAllister's remaining trial, whose date had not been set.^[9]

References