Bail has been set at $25,000 for a Level 3 sex offender living in Centralia who allegedly failed to report to the Department of Corrections in May to have an electronic home monitoring bracelet installed.
The defendant, Sean Butler, 25, is required to register as a sex offender due to a 2018 conviction in Lewis County Superior Court on two counts of communication with a minor for immoral purposes and one count of viewing depictions of a minor engaged in sexually explicit conduct.
Butler registered to live at an address in the 2500 block of North Pearl Street in Centralia in August 2020.
Since then, he has been convicted for escape from community custody twice: one on May 7, 2021, and again on March 9, 2022.
Butler reported to the Department of Corrections’ field office in Lewis County following his most-recent release from jail on May 19 and was told to return the following day to have an electronic home monitoring bracelet installed, according to court documents. Butler allegedly did not return to the field office as ordered.
The Lewis County Prosecutor’s Office filed escape from community custody charges against Butler in June and issued a warrant for Butler’s arrest.
Butler was arrested on that warrant on Aug. 2. A failure to register as a sex offender charge has since been added to his case.
While the arrest warrant set Butler’s bail at $150,000, Judge J. Andrew Toynbee reduced bail to $25,000 during Butler’s preliminary hearing in Lewis County Superior Court on Wednesday.
While Toynbee deemed Butler a “flight risk” and called the allegations a “serious offense” given his criminal history, Toynbee found that $25,000 bail was sufficient to hold Butler.
Butler’s next court appearance is an arraignment scheduled for Aug. 11.
