A Hartford sex offender who attacked a teenage girl and later told police he planned to sexually assault her was ordered committed Monday to the maximum-security Whiting Forensic Hospital.
Thomas J. Connors, 25, will be under the control of the state Psychiatric Security Review Board for 20 years, Superior Court Judge Frank M. D’Addabbo Jr. ordered Monday. Connors was found guilty of attempted first-degree assault for attacking the teen, and then acquitted of the crime by reason of mental disease or defect. The maximum committal period is the same as the maximum prison term for a person convicted of the crime.
On Monday, D’Addabbo heard testimony from Lori Hauser, a forensic psychologist from Whiting who was a member of the team that evaluated Connors after he was sent to the hospital in September. The team recommended that Connors begin treatment at Whiting in Middletown, the state’s most-restrictive setting for mental-health treatment, in order to protect the public and to ensure compliance with treatment.
She testified Monday that Connors is on the autism spectrum, has a variety of personality disorders, blames others for his conduct, and has a history of being treated for sexually inappropriate conduct back to kindergarten.
In response to questions by Hartford Public Defender R. Bruce Lorenzen, Hauser said Whiting proposes treating Connors with medication and therapy. He has expressed a motivation to change and hopes to one day be released, she said.
His problem sexual behaviors have gotten him into legal trouble in the past and he has “shown a persistent and an escalating pattern,” Hauser said. Past treatment has not been successful, she said.
Under questioning by prosecutor Donna Mambrino, Hauser repeated her view that public safety would be at risk if Connors were released into the community, and that he has a pattern of escalating sexually inappropriate conduct.
Lorenzen told the judge that Connors expected a long commitment, but “wishes to be better and lead a more normal life.”
Mambrino urged commitment for the maximum period, noting that even during his trial Connors admitted he had urges to expose himself to his victim.
“No amount of medication or treatment is going to cure this defendant of the issues he suffers from,” Mambrino said. She urged the judge to ensure public safety by committing Connors for 20 years.
Citing Connors’ history of problem sexual behavior, his lack of insight into his illness, the escalating nature of Connors’ conduct and his non-compliance with treatment in the past, the judge opted for the maximum term of 20 years
The victim, 16 at the time of the crime, testified in August and clearly described what happened to her on April 5, 2017, as she walked from Girard Avenue near the UConn Law School toward Elizabeth Park.
She said she realized a man was following her and that as she approached Elizabeth Park, she sent a text message to several friends and a cousin about the man. She walked into an open field where there was a group of people, but he kept following her, she said.
As she crossed Prospect Avenue she could hear the man’s footsteps getting faster and closer, she said. Through tears, she identified Connors and described how the 5-foot-8, 228-pound man grabbed her around the waist and tried to put his hand over her mouth.
The teen, who was 4-foot-11 and 100 pounds, said she made herself small, wiggled away and pushed him off, then was face to face with Connors. “Don’t touch me,” she she told him, and he answered back, “I didn’t touch you.” She then told him she had a GPS tracking device in her phone, and he ran off, she testified.
She called a friend who picked her up and took her home. Her 13-year-old sister was walking home from school, too, and she testified that she feared the man who attacked her would attack her sister.
She called police and provided a detailed description of the man. About three weeks later, while riding in a car with her boyfriend and his mother, she spotted Connors on Farmington Avenue and said she thought that was the man who attacked her. She called police and officers immediately confronted and questioned Connors.
During a subsequent interview, he confessed, telling detectives that when he saw an attractive girl “his urges started acting up,” according to the warrant for his arrest. When the detective asked Connors what he planned to do with the girl, he responded, “I was going to have sex with her,” the warrant says.
Connors is on the state sex-offender registry for sex-crime convictions in the Norwich area.
