Rey DeJesus Jr., 38, most recent address, 8 Forge Drive, Nashua

NASHUA – In Hillsborough County Superior Court South’s first in-person jury trial since the beginning of the pandemic some 14 months ago, jurors on Thursday convicted former Nashua resident Rey DeJesus Jr. of four counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault, charges that accused him of sexually assaulting a then-18-year-old woman on multiple occasions in late 2019.

Jurors also reached not-guilty verdicts on the six other charges on which DeJesus went to trial: Four additional counts of felony AFSA and two counts of sexual assault, which are Class A misdemeanors.

DeJesus, 38, most recently of 8 Forge Drive, now awaits a July 21 hearing to learn the length and terms of the sentence that Judge Charles Temple is scheduled to impose at that hearing, which begins at 8 a.m. in Hillsborough County Superior Court South.

The series of events that led to DeJesus’s arrest in February 2020 began in mid-November 2019, when Nashua police were called to a downtown apartment for reports of a man banging on doors looking for a young woman.

As it turned out, DeJesus would soon be charged with sexually assaulting the same young woman some two months earlier, but the woman had yet to report the assaults to police.

But she did so just four days later, and police detectives launched an investigation into the matter with DeJesus as their chief suspect.

A warrant was eventually issued for DeJesus’s arrest, and on Feb. 24, 2020, uniformed officers located DeJesus, served the warrant and took him into custody.

Police initially charged DeJesus with three counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault, but through their investigation filed five additional AFSA charges and the two misdemeanor counts.

According to police reports at the time, the woman, in interviews with detectives, said that DeJesus, who she described as a “family friend,” had sexually assaulted her in September 2019 – about two months before police responded to the call for someone banging on doors of a downtown apartment house.

That night, the woman told detectives, DeJesus showed up to her apartment and began knocking on her bedroom door. After awhile, the woman told police, she let him in, at which time DeJesus allegedly sexually assaulted her “with force (and) without consent,” according to police.

As their investigation continued, police interviewed DeJesus, who had a much different account of the alleged incident.

He told police the woman “invited him” to her room to “smoke weed,” and soon began “flirting” with him. DeJesus said the woman allegedly tried to get him to perform a sex act upon her, and although he was “reluctant,” he said he “went along” with it, according to police reports.

After further investigation, police issued the warrant for DeJesus’s arrest.

Dean Shalhoup may be reached at 594-1256 or dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.

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