WESTFIELD – A transient man who had been classified as a violent sexual predator in Maine was sentenced to a nine-month term in jail after he pleaded guilty to a charge of failing to register as a sex offender.
City detectives became aware of the man living at Henry’s Trailer Park on Southampton Road when they were asked to assist Department of Children and Families workers as they seized children living in squalor with their mother and the man in a trailer there.
The detectives investigated the man and found that in 2011 Michael L. Asay, 37, of 868 Southampton Road, had been registered as a level one sexual offender in Worcester due to offenses in Maine but the registration had lapsed and he was listed as a violator.
Looking further, the detectives found that the man was free on bail after being charged in Waldo County, Maine, with a recent domestic violence assault on Wanda Martin, the woman he had been living with and the mother of the children removed from the trailer which had no furniture or running water.
Det. Roxanne Bradley found that the terms of his release on bail in Maine included a prohibition that he stay away from Martin and her three children and a requirement that he have no contact with them.
Although by living with Martin and her children Asay appeared to be in direct violation of his bail terms, Bradley found that the Maine bail violation was not extraditable in Massachusetts. Since Asay was listed as a violator for failing to register as a sexual offender in Massachusetts, he was taken into custody and arrested for being a sexual offender who has failed to register.
On Friday, Asay appeared before Judge Philip A. Contant in Westfield District Court and pleaded guilty to the charge.
He was sentenced to a nine-month term in the house of correction with credit for time served awaiting trial since May 23.
