Redmond reacts to news: Bremont back in jail
Less than six months after his release from state prison on a sex abuse conviction, the former executive director of the Redmond Proficiency Academy was back behind bars Sunday, accused of trying to elude an Oregon State Police trooper on a motorcycle at over 100 mph west of Redmond.
Michael Bremont, 41, of Redmond shocked the community back in 2012 when he was convicted of sexually abusing two minors. One girl was a 15-year-old student at the academy.
On Monday, some Redmond residents we talked too were less surprised Bremont was accused of again breaking the law, and more upset he already was out of prison.
“I don’t think somebody like him should have been let out in the first place, with the things that he did to begin with, and maybe things wouldn’t have happened again,” said Redmond mom Rokki Southworth. “He should still be in jail.”
And NewsChannel 21 viewer Cassidy Campbell writes on KTVZ’s Facebook page: “That was NOT a long enough sentence.”
It was around 10:15 p.m. Saturday when the trooper tried to stop a Honda motorcycle heading east on Hwy. 126E near Cline Falls State Park for a speed violation, said OSP Lt. Gregg Hastings.
The motorcycle operated by Bremont instead accelerated to over 100 mph, Hastings said.
The trooper turned on his lights and siren, but Bremont kept going at high speed, passing another eastbound vehicle recklessly before turning off onto Eagle Crest Boulevard, the OSP spokesman said.
As the trooper kept the motorcycle in sight, the rider failed to negotiate a right turn and went off the highway into dirt, Hastings said. It continued about 100 feet before striking a rock, causing the motorcycle to fall on its side and the rider to fall off.
Bremont was taken into custody without further incident, troopers said. He was booked into the Deschutes County Jail in Bend just before midnight on a felony charge of attempt to elude on a vehicle and reckless driving, and cited for speeding (violating the basic rule at over 100 mph).
He was held Sunday without bail on a parole violation charge, having been released from Deer Ridge Correctional Institution in Madras last March after serving 14 months of a 19-month sentence. Bremont is scheduled to next appear in court on Sept. 15.
Bremont was arrested in February 2012 on charges he sexually abused the female student in 2009 and 2010. That June, he was arrested again, on new allegations he had abused a then-17-year-old student at Central Linn High School in Halsey in 2005-2006.
Bremont was sentenced in December 2012 to 19 months in prison, followed by five years’ probation, on the abuse allegations after he entered an Alford plea, meaning he admitted the evidence likely would lead to a conviction.
He also entered the guilty pleas to two other allegations – one a misdemeanor charge of attempting to elude police, stemming from an incident in which he sped away from an OSP trooper at over 100 mph.
The other was of first-degree theft, for stealing computers from the charter school and selling them on eBay. Detectives said Bremont cost the school more than $100,000 and ordered him to pay $50,000 in restitution.
Court papers revealed intimate text messages between Bremont and the then-15-year-old victim in Redmond. At his sentencing, the teen, then 18, told the courtroom Bremont stole her innocence and robbed her trust in men.
