Aug 15, 2016 By Mark Hofmann mhofmann@heraldstandard.Com 3 min read

The state Superior Court has denied the appeal of a rugby referee sentenced for a sexual assault in 2014.

In an opinion filed last week by state Superior Court President Judge Emeritus Kate Ford Elliott, the court denied the appeal of Michael Joseph Grove, 32, of Pittsburgh.

In the Washington County Court of Common Pleas, Grove was sentenced to serve seven and a half to 15 years in prison on the charges of sexual assault and indecent assault.

According to court records, Grove was arrested after he sexually assaulted an 18-year-old woman in California, Washington County, in April 2012.

The woman attended a rugby match earlier that day in which Grove was a referee. Grove, the woman and others were at what was known as the “rugby house” for a social event following the match and while the woman was waiting to go into the bathroom, she and Grove spoke to each other with the woman telling Grove he did a poor job refereeing the game.

Court documents state that Grove grabbed the woman by the arm and repeatedly said, “let me make it up to you” as he locked himself in the bathroom with her and sexually assaulted the woman.

The Herald-Standard does not identify the victims of sexual assault.

The woman was able to send a text message to a friend who then came to her aid as Grove exited the bathroom and said the woman was “pretty drunk” and someone should help her.

In his appeal, Grove questioned whether the trial judge should have permitted testimony that he had grabbed or touched the buttocks of other women during the night of the crime.

In the opinion, Elliot stated the trial court did not introduce evidence of Grove grabbing women’s buttocks prior to the incident to establish a bad characterization of Grove, but to counter the argument that the sexual assault was consensual because Grove grabbed the victim’s buttocks earlier that day, too.

Grove’s appeal also took issue with the trial judge permitting the commonwealth to evoke testimony that Grove was known as “Chester” by a witness because of what the name would imply to a jury.

“(Grove) argues that the use of the name ‘Chester’ is a shortened version of ‘Chester the Molester’ and the use of the name ‘Chester’ when referring to (Grove) was so prejudicial that a mistrial should have been granted,” Elliot writes in the opinion.

A mistrial was not granted by the court, which explained that a witness referring to Grove as “Chester” did not inflame the passions of the jury to a point where Grove would be denied his right to a fair and impartial jury.

Finally, Grove argued in the appeal that his lawyer should have introduced Twitter postings of the victim smoking marijuana and drinking alcohol to counter prosecutors saying she did not drink the night she was assaulted.

The Superior Court denied that argument, stating that Grove did not explain how the fact that someone drank alcohol or smoked marijuana would indicate the state of their mental health.

Grove remains lodged in the State Correctional Institution at Albion.