A 23-year-old Altus man charged in March with a quartet of felony charges received approval Thursday for court appointed counsel after proving himself unable to afford a lawyer, according to court records.

Dewight DeJuan Jasper received the approval during an appearance in Jackson County District Court. He was originally charged with a quartet of felony counts in late March: conspiracy, kidnapping, first-degree rape and first-degree robbery, according to court records.

Jasper is accused, along with a then-14-year-old juvenile, with sexually assaulting and robbing a 20-year-old woman on March 24, according to the affidavit.

Police first received a call to meet with the woman's mother after the reported victim had gone missing from the city park, said Altus Police Sgt. Mike Bell. She said her home phone rang, her son answered and he could hear his sister screaming for help in the background before the call was disconnected, Bell said.

Soon after the phone call, the woman walked into the Jackson County Sheriff's Office and said she'd been raped, the affidavit states. She said that she didn't know her assailants' names but she recognized them from around town and that they walked toward an apparently abandoned home. When she tried to leave, she said she was grabbed and forced inside.

Read the Full Story...