Posted on: Thursday, July 24, 2003

Firefighter gets probation for sex assaults

Advertiser Staff

A 32-year-old Honolulu firefighter was sentenced to a year of probation yesterday for sexually assaulting two Windward O'ahu girls last summer.

In addition, Circuit Judge Richard Perkins ordered Kevin Uhrle to spend four consecutive weekends in jail, perform 100 hours of community service, pay $500 to the Hawai'i Criminal Injuries Compensation Fund and pay a $75 probation fee.

Uhrle pled guilty to four counts of misdemeanor sexual assault arising out of an incident involving two girls, age 13 and 14.

According to a police officer's statement that was filed in court shortly after Uhrle was arrested last year, Uhrle made contact with one of the girls via the Internet and she invited him to come to her Kailua home. Once there, he touched the girl against her wishes. The other girl reported a similar incident, according to the officer's statement.

During yesterday's hearing, Perkins said one of the girls may have passed herself off as 17 and that Uhrle had claimed he was 18.

Perkins told Uhrle that he opted for probation because sentencing him to a year in jail, which was one of the sentencing options, meant that Uhrle would have gone that entire time without receiving "even one day" of sex offender treatment.

Perkins also told Uhrle that he did not want a jail sentence to interfere with his job as a firefighter, which he said is a stabilizing factor in Uhrle's life.