NEW ULM — Brown County Human Services has filed a civil commitment petition for a 25-year-old New Ulm level 3 sex offender to be committed indefinitely to the Minnesota sex offender program.

Colten C. Camacho, 25, who has six convictions for engaging in prostitution with juveniles in Brown and Blue Earth counties, is in the Brown County jail pending a judge’s decision. A civil court trial, after which a Brown County District Court Judge Allison Krehbiel will determine if Camacho should be committed, is set for March 17-19.

Camacho was living in New Ulm on intensive supervised release (ISR) after he was released from prison last April. Many charges including criminal sexual conduct were dismissed in plea deals resulting in a 21-month prison sentence.

The sexually dangerous person (SDP) and sexual psychopathic personality (SPP) petition filed in Brown County District Court Dec. 3 provides that hearings in the SDP/SPP cases shall be held within 90 days of petition filing. The court may continue the matter for up to 30 days for good cause.

The court appointed psychologist Dr. James Alsdurf of Minnetonka as the first examiner. He must file his report no later than March 3. A second court-appointed examiner must file their report by the same date.

In the petition, New Ulm Police Senior Investigator Jeff Hohensee said his first contact with Camacho occurred in 2015 when he received a Cybertip that child pornography was being uploaded at 1759 Oakwood Ave. where Camacho lived with his parents.

A search warrant was executed and computers were seized, but no charges were brought for lack of evidence.

Hohensee said he was alarmed by the number of weapons, military paraphernalia and neo-Nazi memorabilia Camacho displayed in his bedroom.

Hohensee said Camacho was arrested for incidents that snowballed into numerous criminal charges. Hohensee said Camacho’s parents bonded him out of jail, he was arrested for intimidating victims, and he was again bonded out by his parents.

Hohensee said that when he announced his candidacy for Brown County sheriff, Camacho began a personal vendetta against him, drafting phony news articles saying Hohensee was under investigation for using prostitutes and sent them to numerous Minnesota news outlets.

A false news story was posted to Facebook and other social media sites.

Hohensee said that while he was campaigning on June 18, 2018, Camacho followed him, yelling obscenities and false allegations, and phoned him and threatened him and his family.

“He blames everything on me and takes no responsibility for his actions. I have never had someone take a case and make it personal like this in my (29-year) career,” Hohensee said.

Camacho’s attorney at a January 2019 hearing asked that a risk level 2 be assigned to Camacho.

Camacho claimed many of the victims recanted their statements and denied the special concerns assigned to him by a risk level 3 recommendation.

Camacho said he wanted to enter a religious-based treatment program because he claimed everyone has an addiction problem of some sort.

Fritz Busch can be emailed at fbusch@nujournal.com.