The following is a press release from the Mendocino County District Attorney’s Office:
A Mendocino County Superior Court jury returned from deliberations Tuesday to announce that it had found the trial defendant not guilty as charged.
Defendant Steve Allen Couthren, age 63, generally of Ukiah, was found not guilty of failing to register with local law enforcement as a sex registrant with prior convictions for failing to timely register.
Couthren remains required by law to continue to timely register as a sex registrant and, in doing so, to keep law enforcement notified of his residence and whereabouts.
This registration mandate flows from prior Lake County convictions in 2001 for lewd and lascivious acts on a child under the age of 14 years.
Because the jury found Couthren not guilty, the bifurcated issue of whether he has also suffered two prior Strike convictions was moot.
The law enforcement agency that investigated this matter was the Ukiah Police Department.
Deputy District Attorney Juan Jose “Joe” Guzman was the prosecutor who presented the People’s evidence to the jury and argued for conviction.
The two-day jury trial was heard in the courtroom of Mendocino County Superior Court Judge Keith Faulder.
