Published on June 25, 2020
GREELEY, Colo. (Weld County D.A.) – A Greeley man could spend life in prison after sexually assaulting a woman at his residence in February of 2019. A judge sentenced Matthew Shepherd, 40, to 30 years to life in the Colorado Department of Corrections last week, after a jury convicted him in January of Sexual Assault by Force, a class 3 felony, and Unlawful Sexual Contact, a class 4 felony. In the early morning hours of February 17, 2019, a woman called 911 and reported she had just been sexually assaulted by Shepherd. When officers arrived at her location, they noticed the victim had a large bruise on her forehead and bruises on her forearms. The victim told police the defendant became angry when she refused to have sexual intercourse with him. After repeatedly asking him to stop removing her clothing, the defendant then pinned the victim down on his bed by placing his knees on both her forearms. Shepherd then placed his penis in the victim’s mouth and demanded that she give him oral sex. She asked him several times to stop, but he refused. When the victim tried escaping, the defendant pushed her into his closet. In an attempt to stop the forced oral sex, the victim bit the defendant’s penis, which caused him to elbow the victim in the forehead. He also ripped the victim’s smart watch off her wrist to prevent her from calling 911. The defendant then told the victim that the only way she’d be able to go home is if she gave him oral sex again “like she meant it.” After obeying his commands, she was finally able to escape with only a few articles of her clothing before calling 911. The night of the assault was her second time meeting the defendant in-person, after connecting with him through mutual friends on Facebook. The Greeley Police Department investigated this case. Deputy District Attorneys Tamara Love and Matthew Peterson prosecuted this case.