PROVO, Utah (ABC4 Utah) - A registered sex offender from Provo is back on the streets after police say he raped an elderly woman. 42-Year-old Jeffrey Scofield has been charged with aggravated kidnapping, forcible sexual abuse and rape.
          
According to the Probable Cause statement the 73-year-old victim in this case told police Scofield handcuffed her to her bed and raped her. After obtaining a search warrant police found evidence of the alleged assault and arrested Scofield on February 3rd.
         
This is not Scofield's first run in with the law. In 2004 he was found guilty of two counts of sexual abuse of a child. He spent 6 years in prison and underwent therapy.
          
Despite knowing that Scofield was on the sex offender registry, and police stating that they felt he was a danger to the victim, the judge in the case allowed him to be released on a $25,000 cash only bail. In the PC statement the judge was given it was written, "If Jeffrey is released he could be a danger to the victim..."
         
Kent Morgan, a former prosecutor with the Salt Lake County District Attorney's Office, says there are only a few exceptions when bail would be denied. "Do we make mistakes? Do people get out sometimes and commit further offenses, yes," said Morgan. "That's terrible, but hat's the cost of having a constitution in the United States where you're innocent until proven guilty. And bail is set to protect the public and not to punish somebody before trial."

But victim advocates with the Utah Coalition Against Sexual Assault say the exception in this case is Scofield's history of sexual violence. UCASA's Executive Director Turner C. Bitton said, "In most cases folks that are not a danger to others deserve the right to bail. This individual has exhibited a pattern of violent behavior, interfered in the original case child sexual abuse case, and he's exhibited a behavior of danger. And law enforcement said this themselves that they had concerns that he was likely to re-offend."

Scofield's next hearing date is set for February 9th. It's possible the prosecutor could ask the judge for the bail to be modified. At the time of this report the Utah County Attorney's Office said their office had not screened Scofield's case.

This piece originally appeared on good4utah.com. Click here to read the original article.