Alleged Child Molester Kills Self Before Trial
The Capital Times :: METRO :: C8
Monday, January 7, 2008
By MIKE MILLER The Capital Times

A 48-year-old man, who was scheduled to go on trial today for sexually assaulting a pre-teen girl for several years, committed suicide at his trailer home near Stoughton.

Terry C. Karna faced one count of repeated sexual assault of a child under the age of 13. The case against him was scheduled for jury selection in front of Dane County Circuit Judge Patrick Fiedler until Assistant District Attorney Doug McLean informed Fiedler that Karna had killed himself. The case was dismissed.

McLean said Karna had written a letter recently to his family in Minnesota, apparently indicating that he was going to kill himself, and when the family received the letter they immediately called the Dane County Sheriff's Office. Deputies went to Karna's trailer home on Norman Drive near Lake Kegonsa on Friday night and found he had killed himself with a gun, McLean said.

Karna was facing a maximum sentence of 40 years of prison and extended supervision time if he had been convicted. He had repeatedly turned down offers to settle the case and insisted he was going to trial, McLean said.

According to the criminal complaint, Karna began assaulting the girl when she was in pre-school and continued until the summer between her sixth and seventh grades.

The girl told an interviewer from the Dane County Department of Human Services that Karna would fondle her, insert his finger in her vagina, and would have her fondle his *****, according the complaint. The girl said Karna had been drinking during all of the assaults.

"It made me feel really sick and violated," the girl said during that interview, according to the criminal complaint.