A Warren County man had his sentence upheld by the Iowa Court of Appeals as released on Tuesday. Court documents state then 25-year-old Vincent Ewurs videotaped two teenage girls in the shower, gave them pills that would make them “trip,” and asked one of the girls to encourage the other to have sex with him. Pursuant to a plea agreement with the State, Ewurs entered a guilty plea to lascivious acts with a child, two counts of invasion of privacy involving nudity, and child endangerment. In exchange, the State agreed to dismiss five other counts that had been filed against Ewurs.

The district court sentenced Ewurs to a mix of concurrent and consecutive terms of imprisonment not to exceed nine years, and registering as a sex offender.

Ewurs’ appeal claimed the court “abused its discretion when sentencing [him] to a term of incarceration to not exceed nine years instead of suspending the sentence and placing him on probation” and the district court gave disproportionate weight to the nature of the offense and used primarily boilerplate language when discussing the reasons for imposing a term of incarceration.

The Iowa Court of Appeals elected to not overturn the sentence as handed out by the district court judge.

https://www.iowacourts.gov/courtcases/22954/embed/CourtAppealsOpinion

*photo from Iowa Sex Offender Registry