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Jury selection begins in Tucumcari kidnapping, child sex case

TUCUMCARi — Jury selection began Monday for a convicted Curry County sex offender who is charged with kidnapping and sexual assaulting a Tucumcari 9-year-old.

Kenneth Leon Mills, 30, is charged with two felony counts of criminal sexual penetration of a minor, kidnapping and aggravated burglary.

According to court documents, the alleged attack occurred on Aug. 26, 2008, at a residence in south Tucumcari.

The child’s mother said a man she knew “had entered the residence and then she said he had raped her daughter,” according to court documents.

Mills was arrested later that day.

New Mexico’s sex offender registry reports Mills was convicted of criminal sexual penetration in 1998 in Curry County. He registered as a sex offender in September 2003.

Mills entered a plea of not guilty Aug. 27, 2008, in Quay County Magistrate Court.

Mills has been held on a $250,000 bond at the Quay County Detention Center since his arrest.

 
 
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