A Portland man who was given life in prison thanks to Oregon’s three-strikes law for sex offenders saw the sentence cut on Friday following a series of court reversals and the disappearance of vital evidence.
Gregory Hightower, now 56, was convicted of using teenage girls in a prostitution scheme in 2013. It was his third such conviction.
At the time, prosecutors said Hightower had been involved in sex trafficking operations since he was a teenager.
Appellate judges in 2021 ordered Hightower be given a new trial. It was only then that investigators discovered that key surveillance recordings had either been lost or mistakenly destroyed by Portland Police Bureau during the interim.
The case was heading to a new trial next month, but Hightower instead struck a deal Friday — pleading no contest to three counts of promoting prostitution and one count of compelling prostitution.
“I would have fought it all the way,” Hightower said in court, “but my boy misses me.”
Circuit Judge Kelly Skye sentenced Hightower to 14 years in prison, or effectively time served, and ordered him to register as a sex offender, pursuant to the terms of the plea deal set by prosecutors. He will be released from custody early next week.
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