BY RACHEL MELCER
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Former Harrison police chief Tom Keenan said Friday that he once considered the woman who accused him of rape and gross sexual imposition to be a friend.
In testimony in the second week of his trial, Mr. Keenan praised the professional conduct of the 41-year-old Harrison woman, who worked closely with Mr. Keenan at the Harrison police department where she says he raped and fondled her.
And he told a jury of four men and eight women in Hamilton County Common Pleas Court that he had felt sorry for her and empathized with her personal problems.
That's why he never told anyone that she was giving him reams of sexually explicit letters, withholding them for weeks even after he was indicted, he said.
And even though she was responsible for a Harrison City Council investigation that began the unraveling of Mr. Keenan's career, he testified that he never considered the woman to be a threat worthy of his bringing a sexual harassment complaint to city or police department officials.
"I didn't start out being afraid of (the woman). I started out feeling sorry for her. I didn't want her to be embarrassed" or lose her job, he said.
Yet Mr. Keenan admitted under cross examination that in another incident, he disparaged the woman to a co-worker. "It was in response to (the officer) saying she believed (the woman) was a damsel in distress. I said (the woman) was a lower form of life," he said. The woman, on paid sick leave from her job as Harrison Mayor's Court clerk, accused Mr. Keenan of twice touching her breasts, once forcing her to fondle his genitals and twice raping her with digital penetration.
Judge Steven Martin also allowed prosecutors to question Mr. Keenan Friday on allegations that he once removed from his personnel file and shredded a negative police report. But attorneys were not allowed to introduce evidence that the report said Mr. Keenan once held a gun to the wife of his ex-wife. Mr. Keenan denied both allegations.
The defense rested its case at the conclusion of his testimony. Closing arguments will be made and jury deliberation should begin on Monday, Judge Martin said.
