Elise Nelson/Winonan

Ramone L. Newell, a convicted sex offender, has been charged with first-, second- and third-degree criminal sexual conduct, criminal sexual predatory conduct and first-degree burglary in connection with the sexual assault of a Winona State University student last spring.

On April 25, 2013, according to the complaint, at approximately 4:50 a.m. a student woke to find a person crouched at the foot of her bed. When she asked, “who are you?” the person told her to shut up and that he had a knife. He checked the hallway before telling her to roll onto her side or stomach and then forced her onto her back, covered her face with a pillowcase and pulled off her pajama pants.

The man touched her and ordered her to do sexually explicit things while standing at the foot of her bed, according to the complaint. He then left the woman’s room, taking her cell phone with him. Once he had left, the woman managed to contact someone via Facebook to call the police for her. Approximately twenty minutes after the assault had begun, the police arrived at her apartment.

The woman described her attacker to the police as a black male between 5 feet 7 inches and 5 feet 10 inches tall and wearing a baggy, black-hooded sweatshirt.

Investigators at the scene took a cast of footprints outside the victim’s window and swabbed a combination light and fan switch for DNA that the victim said the aggressor had touched.

According to Kevin O’Laughlin, the assistant county attorney, these tests were one of the reasons these charges were not made until more than 4 months after the initial incident.

Newell’s boots were seized and were found to be a positive match to the footprints found outside the victim’s house, according to the complaint. The DNA test done on the fan switch in the victim’s bedroom showed that the victim and Newell could not be excluded from being contributors.

O’Laughlin said Newell was already in police custody on an unrelated charge on Sept. 6 and was then charged and arrested that day.

Sara Fry, a Winona State exercise science major, said she was relieved when Newell was charged for the April incident because she had lived near the apartment Newell had allegedly broken in to.

“It freaked me out,” Fry said. “He took people’s sense of security. He made many girls in Winona feel unsafe in their own homes.”

At Newell’s hearing on Wednesday, Sept. 11, the court set an omnibus hearing for 2:30 p.m. on Oct. 3.

O’Laughlin said this postponed hearing would give Newell time to bring forward any challenges to evidence.

“At the hearing, I would anticipate that he will address or identify any challenges he might have to the evidence or probable cause,” O’Laughlin said.

O’Laughlin said Newell is currently being held in the Wabasha County Jail with bail set at $1 million.

Contact Elise at [email protected]