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Man gets jail time for assaults
McCOOK, Neb. -- An article published Monday, April 20, "Man gets jail time for assaults," incorrectly stated the parentage of a 7-year-old boy who was taken into custody the day of Geihsler's arrest. According to court documents, Valerie Geihsler is step-mother to the two girls and the 7-year-old boy.
In addition, many of the allegations in the article were from the Probable Cause Affidavit and Witness Statements filed with the court, and while alleged, were not proven in a trial because a plea agreement was reached before trial.
McCOOK, Neb. -- A rural McCook man was ordered to serve jail time and attend anger management classes stemming from a disturbing assault of his wife and two young daughters.
The offender, 35-year-old James Conrad Geihsler of 39077 County Road 708, accepted a plea agreement in February admitting guilt to a Class 3A felony for child abuse and a Class I misdemeanor for negligent child abuse. Geihsler was subsequently sentenced earlier this month to serve 45 days in jail and 36 months on Community Based Intervention probation. He was also ordered by Red Willow County District Court Judge David Urbom to attend anger management counseling, a cognitive thinking program and parenting classes.
The charges against Geihsler stem from a series of assaults and death threats occurring on Sept. 23, 2014. The incident was brought to the attention of authorities by staff members at Southwest High School who were alerted by a classmate of Geihsler's 13-year-old daughters.
Geihsler became angry when his daughters didn't ride the bus home from school and tracked them down at an Indianola park. According to court documents he immediately began threatening to kill the girls, yelling "I'm going to kill you guys and I'm going to enjoy it," when he pulled up. During the subsequent drive home, Geihsler repeatedly struck and threatened the girls, telling them they had two choices, "get punched to death or choked to death."
The girls attempted to explain they had sent a text message to their mother informing her they would be playing football at the park after school, however, Geihsler wasn't satisfied and began a lengthy physical assault of the two.
The girl's recounted the ordeal to investigators the following day, one of them visibly scared and shaking, saying she didn't want to go home. The other wasmore able to hold her emotions in despite a bruised and swollen nose. While being interviewed she said she tried not to cry during the assault, because if she cried, her father would make it worse.
The girls were seated in the back seat of Geihsler's pickup as he drove towards their rural home. He ordered one of them to put her head close so he could punch her and added, "if you block me, you will die." He struck the girl above her eye socket and followed it up with a second blow across the bridge of her nose, causing it to bleed for approximately 30 minutes. The girl said afterwards she remembered hearing her neck crack when Geihsler struck her.
He repeated the process with his second daughter before stopping at a field across from a rural church.
The girls told investigators he took them one at a time into the cornfield and continued his assault, hitting them in the face and pushing them to the ground multiple times.
When the three finally arrived home Geihsler immediately turned his anger to his wife, Valerie Geihsler, punching her in the face before arming himself with a tree branch and continuing the assault. According to court documents Geihsler struck his wife in the knee with the branch, knocking her to the ground and leaving her barely able to walk while being interviewed by authorities the next day.
Geihsler's wife also suffered a ruptured ear drum during the assault and told investigators her husband had threatened her in the past, saying he would not only kill her, but would cut her body into pieces and disperse them in various places so that she could not be found.
The two girls and the 7-year-old boy were taken into custody the day of Geihsler's arrest. According to court documents, Valerie Geihsler is step-mother to the two girls and the young boy. Geihsler's daughters told investigators they were fearful to go to their biological mother's home, out of fear of what their father would do to her.
Geihsler was originally facing two Class 3A felony offenses alleging child abuse, in addition to a Class I misdemeanor offense alleging third degree domestic assault. The arresting officer requested the domestic assault charge be pursued as a third Class 3A felony, citing a domestic assault that caused bodily injury with a dangerous instrument. Special Prosecutor George C. Welch with the Nebraska Attorney General's Office pursued the domestic assault charge as Class I misdemeanor offense before dismissing it entirely as part of a plea agreement.