Jacob Rudnick, accused of sexual assault in two separate cases, is getting a lowered bond that could allow him to be released before his first trial in November.
Rudnick, 30, has been charged with two counts of third-degree sexual assault and one count of second-degree sexual assault for an attack that allegedly took place in a park in the Town of Lessor on Halloween night in 2022. The case is scheduled for a three-day trial Dec. 3-5.
Rudnick is facing another case involving a sexual assault that reportedly took place in July 2023 in Lessor. In that case, he faces two counts of second-degree sexual assault. The trial for that case is also scheduled for three days, from Nov. 6-8.
Rudnick was free on a $100,000 cash bond from the 2023 case when he was arrested Sept. 12, 2023, in Seymour. Shawano-Menominee County Circuit Court Judge Katherine Sloma assessed a $200,000 cash bond against Rudnick.
Rudnick is currently in the Shawano County Jail and has been for about a year, which makes it difficult to prepare for trial, according to his attorney, Christopher Van Wagner. He said he has waited hours at times to see his client, and that Rudnick has not yet been able to see a thumb drive with the defense’s evidence to help prepare.
“The way I gave it to him is I gave it to them (jail personnel),” Van Wagner said. “When you approach trial, things come up. Trial preparation produces more information and more need to talk freely and talk, as you may know, at ridiculous times of the night or day. That thumb drive was sent to the jail on Monday (Aug. 5). He has yet to get access to it.”
Van Wagner proposed making the bond $50,000 cash for both cases, noting that Rudnick’s parents plan to post the bond. He said that some conditions would include being required to remain on his parents’ farm except for medical appointments and meetings with his attorney, as well as not being allowed to drive outside of the farm and not being allowed to use the internet except when it came to viewing the digital evidence.
Van Wagner said that a five-year review of court cases in Shawano-Menominee County Circuit Court showed that no other second-degree sexual assault cases in the counties had a six-digit cash bond attached to it. Two of the cases have $50,000 bonds, according to online court records, with one from this year coming from a previous offender with a felony record and domestic violence being part of the case, and the other case in 2020 involving a defendant previously convicted of a first-degree sexual assault.
Among the eight second-degree sexual assault cases besides Rudnick’s is one in May where the defendant is out on a signature bond, battery is also charged and there was a prior record of felony theft. Another one from 2022 only assessed $3,500 and resulted in a failure to appear in 2023; that case is still open.
Even when including first-degree and third-degree sexual assaults, Van Wagner said there was only one case of first-degree assault that resulted in a six-figure bond, but there was a homicide charge attached to that case. He said that, by contrast, Rudnick had no prior criminal record and no other extenuating circumstances before his first arrest.
In a letter to Judge William Kussel Jr., Van Wagner wrote that Rudnick has no job and no assets to post the bond on his own, and that the chart he submitted shows that the sexual assault cases that had lower bonds included any kind of “house arrest” like he was proposing.
“At this point, Jacob is as frustrated as I am that our inability to do the kind of work that we need to,” Van Wagner said.
Assistant District Attorney Laura Nelson told Kussel that she had been ready to object to any kind of reduction in bond, but she understood the circumstances. She was not comfortable with $50,000 bond for both cases and requested $50,000 for each case and asked that, in addition to the house arrest proposed by Van Wagner, requiring an ankle bracelet to provide GPS monitoring of Rudnick to make sure he’s not leaving to meet women.
“Certainly, law enforcement cannot be monitoring and doing drive-bys every hour on the hour,” Nelson said. “That’s just not practical. I think there has to be some objective mechanism to ensure that Mr. Rudnick is not leaving that house, except for those very limited circumstances that Attorney Van Wagner indicated.”
Kussel reduced the bond to $100,000 total between the two cases with the restrictions Van Wagner and Nelson requested.
lpulaski@newmedia-wi.com
Rudnick’s bond in sexual assault cases reduced
