WESTFIELD – A former city couple are in prison after pleading guilty to multiple charges stemming from horrific abuse of a 14-year-old girl who was entrusted to their care.
Nathaniel Justin Lami, 33, and Leonne Anne Vieu, 24, both formerly of 50 Southampton Road, were both sentenced to jail time in Hampden Superior Court after pleading guilty to charges stemming from their treatment of a girl who was allowed to spend a school vacation with them in the basement bedroom they shared at Lami’s mother’s apartment at Colonial Pine Acres, a subsidized apartment complex on Southampton Road.
At their arraignments in Westfield District Court in May, 2013, District Attorney Mary Partyka said that the girl had known Vieu as a neighbor when she was in fifth grade and also knew Lami. Partyka said that she “considered him to be a big brother figure.”
City Detective Daniel Gustafson investigated the initial complaint and found that the girl had spent her April vacation with the couple who abused her while she was with them.
When Gustafson secured a warrant to search the residence the evidence he recovered included a “sex slave contract” the girl said she had been coerced to sign in which she agreed “not to tell” what the couple did with her.
Gustafson’s investigation revealed that what they did was exploit the girl in several ways.
The investigators found, Partyka told the court, that Lami had repeatedly raped the girl, orally, digitally and with his penis and that Vieu had digitally penetrated her too.
She said that Vieu had helped Lami, choosing clothing for the girl to wear while he posed her with Vieu and made videos of them kissing while Vieu fondled her bared breasts and other private parts.
In addition to the sexual exploitation, the girl told investigators that Lami had used what she said was a scalpel to make cuts on her back before licking the blood oozing from the lacerations he made. The girl also said that the duo had coerced her to smoke marijuana with them which she said she had not done before they introduced her to the drug.
After arraignment in Westfield District Court, the charges in district court were dismissed and the duo was transferred to the jurisdiction of Hampden Superior Court where both subsequently pleaded guilty.
Lami pleaded guilty to seven charges of rape and abuse of a child aggravated by age difference, three charges of posing or exhibiting a child in a lewd or lascivious manner, two charges of indecent assault and battery on a person 14 years-of-age or older and single charges of reckless endangerment of a child and possession of child pornography.
In March, Judge Richard J. Carey, sentenced him to six concurrent terms of 7-9 years in state prison, three concurrent two and a half year terms and ten years of probation to commence upon his release from prison.
He was credited with 676 days he had served prior to trial.
Vieu appeared before Judge Constance Sweeney at the end of March and pleaded guilty to inducing a chaste minor to have sexual intercourse and to reckless endangerment of a child. Other charges – including rape and abuse of a child, indecent assault and posing or exhibiting a child in the nude – were not prosecuted.
She was sentenced to a two and a half year term in jail with six months to be served directly and the balance suspended. In addition, she was sentenced to a seven year term of probation to begin upon her release.
Sweeney also ordered that she abide by several restrictions when she is released.
Vieu must stay away from the victim or her family and may have no contact with them; she may have no unsupervised contact with children younger than 16 years-of-age; she may not care for children, live with children or work or volunteer in any situation which will bring her into contact with children. In addition, the judge ordered that she must be evaluated for sexual offender treatment and must participate and successfully complete any recommended treatment.
