Boyfriend admits sexually assaulting and choking girlfriend in dorm after initially facing claims of waterboarding and holding her captive for days

Keanu Labatte, inset in a Ramsey County Jail mug shot; St. Catherine University (KTSP screengrab)

A 20-year-old in Minnesota who was initially accused of holding his girlfriend of two months captive for three days, raping her and waterboarding her in a university dorm room, has pleaded guilty to one sex crime ahead of trial, taking much more serious charges off the table.

Keanu Avery Labatte of Granite Falls pleaded guilty on Friday in Ramsey County to second-degree criminal sexual conduct , which his defense has described as an admission to non-consensual sexual contact involving the use of force by choking the victim in September 2023 inside of a dorm room at St. Catherine’s University.

During a phone call with Law&Crime, the defendant’s attorney Thomas Beito confirmed the defense will be asking the judge to sentence Labatte to probation, though prosecutors will seek the maximum 90 months (7.5 years) in prison allowed under an agreement.

“It’s easy to make allegations, it’s tougher to prove them,” Beito said, noting that in exchange for the guilty plea the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office agreed to dismiss charges of first-degree criminal sexual conduct, threats of violence, and domestic assault by strangulation. The top charge could have led to three decades of imprisonment upon conviction at trial.

The attorney said if a judge signs off on the agreement, Labatte would have to register as a sex offender, likely for 10 years, and could sentence him to up to a year in jail even in a scenario where probation was the punishment. Prior to sentencing, Labatte will also have to undergo a psychosexual evaluation that would aid the judge’s decision.

The defense lawyer also stated that what was initially reported about the case didn’t happen, and he suggested that prosecutors were not confident enough in the evidence to prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt at trial.

Dennis Gerhardstein, a spokesman for the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office, told Law&Crime that the prosecution will be seeking the maximum punishment of 90 months in prison following the defendant’s admission to forced sexual penetration.

“When he pled guilty, as part of the agreement, the facts that he admitted to are non-consensual sexual penetration using force and causing injury,” Gerhardstein said. “He said he grabbed her by the neck and forced her to have intercourse and caused her pain.”

When the criminal case first arose, a criminal complaint alleged that Labatte raped the victim over a period of three days and waterboarded her in a bathtub in her dorm after becoming enraged by texts and photos on her phone.

The victim told investigators she was so “terrified” that she “would just lay next to Labatte and not move for fear of what he would do to her.” She recalled the suspect moving a mattress inside the dorm room from the bed frame to the floor, so that the bed wouldn’t squeak. The victim further alleged that Labatte “punched her in the stomach four times, twice in the throat and once in the face.”

The victim said Labatte eventually allowed her leave the dorm room to get food and gave her back her phone, which is when she called the police, according to the complaint.

When authorities got to the dorm, Labatte was allegedly still in the room and stated “I plead the Fifth.”

According to the plea agreement obtained by Law&Crime , Labatte acknowledged that he knew what he was doing at the time of the crime, that he made an informed decision to plead guilty, and that he understood that prosecution’s evidence against him.

The sentencing hearing was set for the afternoon of Nov. 4.

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