Sex offender lands in jail for failure to register

Fifteen days after escaping jail time in a July 3 guilty plea for indecent behavior with a juvenile, Dex Clements landed behind bars, where he remains after an arrest by Patterson police on a warrant for failing to register as a sex offender in Berwick.
After his plea to indecent behavior he was given three years of supervised probation and ordered to register as a sex offender for 15 years by 16th Judicial District Judge Paul deMahy. While pleading guilty to the charge, Clements, 27, did not admit his guilt when he agreed to what is called a best-interest plea.
Berwick Police Chief James Richard said state probation and parole officers meet in Berwick every Thursday and they asked him if Clements, 27, who lists his address as the 2000 block of River Road in Berwick, had registered with the local department.
“It is mandatory that sex offenders register with the parish as well as any municipality in which they may live,” Richard said. “My understanding is that he registered with the parish and he was told at that time that he still needed to register in Berwick.”
Clements is prohibited from possessing pornography, or having contact with people under 18. He was also fined $1,000, ordered to pay various court costs, submit to drug screen, stay out of bars and complete an anger management course.
Clements told deMahy that he lived with his fiancée and her two children aged 8 and 9, according to the transcripts of his plea. deMahy refused to make an exception to his order to stay away from minors. He told Clements that after counseling and six months of probation, Clements could make a report to the judge and he might allow it then.
Clements was accused by a girl of having committed two sexual batteries upon her seven years earlier when she was 6 years old, the April 1, 2013, St. Mary Parish Sheriff’s arrest affidavit states. The victim said she saw Clements at a movie theater in Morgan City where he attempted to hug her after hugging her mother. She said she recoiled from Clements and her mother asked her why and that is when she told her mother of the incident, the affidavit states.
The girl said she fell asleep while a passenger in Clements’ truck and he had touched her inappropriately while they were inside the truck. The girl told police her parents were behind the truck in their vehicle. The victim said Clements molested her again after he carried her into her bedroom, the affidavit stated.
The incident would have had to happen between October 2006 and March 2007, when the family was having significant contact with Clements, her mother said in the affidavit.
The Daily-Review is not identifying the mother in an effort to protect the privacy of a sex-crime victim.
Erica Rose was the assistant district attorney prosecuting the case.
“I met with the family at the beginning and the victim, as is my custom in cases, like this,” Rose said. “I explained the difficulties in prosecuting the case, including the delayed reporting of the crime and other factors.” She said she explained there was a “possibility that there would be no long-term sentence imposed.”
Rose said someone on her staff keeps victims notified of all court dates. She said she had not personally spoken to the family since her original meeting with them.
In the initial meeting with the family, Rose said she explained that final decisions on how to prosecute the case and what pleas would be accepted are made by the district attorney’s office. There were no promises as to what pleas the district attorney would accept, she said.
The victim’s mother said they were caught unawares by Clements’ plea and sentence and were upset about it when they learned of it.
“We were told this was going to trial on July 14 and that he would be serving jail time. We were told we would be notified of any plea bargain,” the mother said. “We got a call the Monday after, telling us we did not have to show up on the 14th because he pleaded guilty.”