BAKER CITY — The trial of a Baker County man accused of sexually abusing a child has been moved from next week to late November 2022, almost three years after he was arrested.

Bill David Gonyer, 75, is being treated for cancer, and he suffered a heart attack in March 2022, according to an April 27 motion from his Baker City attorney, Damien Yervasi.

“During this chemotherapy regime, moving forward with the trial undermines his treatment and could cause prejudicial harm to his health,” Yervasi wrote in the motion. “It also forces him to choose between going to trial and forgoing a potentially lifesaving treatment or failing to appear and facing the legal consequences.”

Gonyer, who is accused of 15 separate crimes that carry mandatory minimum prison sentences were he convicted, was scheduled to go to trial May 9 in Baker County Circuit Court.

Baker County District Attorney Greg Baxter said on Monday, May 2, he was prepared for trial but that he understands Gonyer’s health problems.

In an April 27 motion in response to Yervasi’s motion, Baxter wrote that although he did not object to the motion to delay the trial, “the victim, her family, law enforcement, and I all wish that this case could go to trial in May. I have reviewed Mr. Yervasi’s motion. I believe that he has satisfied the Court’s parameters to get a continuance.”

In his April 27 motion, Yervasi wrote that Gonyer was not able to participate in a trial starting May 9.

“Mr. Gonyer’s chemotherapy has affected his cognitive abilities through the well-documented condition known as ‘chemobrain’ or ‘chemo fog,’” Yervasi wrote. “Mr. Gonyer’s chemotherapy and other health conditions prevent him from actively participating in his defense by potentially analyzing the facts or preparing to testify. He is unable because he is often too sick, tired, or confused.”

Yervasi also cited another factor that has left the defense unprepared to go to trial this month.

He wrote that an investigator the defense hired to review electronic devices and data that police seized from Gonyer estimated it would take up to 100 hours to analyze the documents and devices.

As of the end of March, the defense investigator had spent 40 hours reviewing the materials, Yervasi wrote.

The process takes considerable time because the defense investigator is allowed to examine the data only at an Oregon Department of Justice office, Yervasi wrote. The next visit was scheduled for May 3-4.

“Forcing the defense to go to trial without finalizing this examination creates an extreme prejudice against the Defendant,” Yervasi wrote.

He also wrote in the April 27 motion that a different defense investigator has been unable to work on the case recently while caring for a severely ill family member.

Baxter said Gonyer has been living in the Boise area.

Gonyer no longer is required to wear an ankle monitor, which allows police to monitor his movements, because a doctor determined that the monitor was restricting blood flow, Baxter said.

Gonyer, who lived on Stices Gulch Road about 12 miles south of Baker City, was initially arrested on Dec. 28, 2019, in Ada County, Idaho, where he was receiving medical care. He was extradited to Baker County in early January 2020 and was held at the Baker County Jail until December 2020, when Judge Thomas B. Powers granted a motion from Yervasi to grant Gonyer a conditional release so he could get medical treatment at the Boise VA Hospital and other facilities.

Gonyer lived in a motel in Baker City during 2021, but he was required to wear the ankle monitor at that time.

Gonyer originally was indicted on several crimes related to the sexual assault of a girl younger than 14 who was known to him, the crimes allegedly happening between May 1, 2019, and Dec. 20, 2019.

• Five counts of first-degree sexual abuse, a Class B felony.

• Two counts of second-degree sexual abuse, a Class C felony.

• Six counts of third-degree sexual abuse, a Class A misdemeanor.

• Two counts of second-degree unlawful sexual penetration, a Class B felony.

• Two counts of contributing to the sexual abuse of a minor, a Class A misdemeanor.

• One count of first-degree rape, a Class A felony.

• One count of second-degree rape, a Class B felony.

• One count of third-degree rape, a Class C felony.

• One count of luring a minor, a Class C felony.

• One count of using a child in a display of sexually explicit conduct, a Class A felony.

• Six counts of felon in possession of a firearm, a Class C felony.

In February 2021 several other charges were added, including four counts of first-degree encouraging child sexual abuse and four counts of second-degree encouraging child sexual abuse. Those charges are related to child pornography discovered on Gonyer’s computer during the course of the investigation, Baxter said.

The pornography doesn’t involve the child who is Gonyer’s alleged victim in the other incidents.

Gonyer is a registered sex offender. He was convicted of the felony crime of sexual abuse in Clackamas County in 1999. Gonyer, who was living at Gladstone at the time, was sentenced to 75 months in prison after pleading guilty to one count of first-degree sexual abuse involving a girl younger than 14, court documents state. That crime took place in February 1998.