OROVILLE: A 14-year-old Oroville girl had dreamed of singing on the TV show American idol. But "the music died" in 2007, her grandmother told a judge Thursday, when the teen was abducted and raped near her school.
The victim joined her mother and grandmother in asking the court to sentence Claude Adelbert Wilcox, 22, to the maximum time behind bars.
Claude Wilcox
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"You took something away from me that I will never have again," the teenager told Wilcox at his Butte County Superior Court sentencing.
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Wilcox, who at the time of the rape was on parole for prior convictions of false imprisonment and sexual battery, was Thursday given the upper-term of 25 years in prison for forcible rape, kidnapping and assault with a deadly weapon.
The latter charge referred to an attack on the victim's 15-year-old boyfriend with a whiskey bottle just prior to the rape, according to police reports.
Deputy district attorney Brent Redelsperger called "ludicrous," the defendant's claims to police that sex with the girl had been consensual.
The 14-year-old was reportedly walking near Central Middle School at night with her 15-year-old boyfriend on Sept. 16, 2007 when they said Wilcox approached them, saying he'd been in a fight and needed assistance.
The youths agreed to follow Wilcox to a nearby campsite behind the Taco Bell restaurant on Olive Highway.
The two told Oroville police later that they were sitting on some cardboard, when Wilcox struck the boy over the head with the liquor bottle and then dragged the terrified girl into an adjacent drainage ditch.
She told police that after punching her in the face and threatening to shoot her if she didn't take off her clothing, the parolee raped her twice, before moving the naked girl an additional 120 yards into a drainage pipe, where she was sexually assaulted two more times.
The victim managed to escape and flag down a passing motorist, who called 9-1-1.
Wilcox was identified during a photo lineup by both the girl and boy.
At his sentencing Thursday, the dark-haired victim said she is now too afraid to sleep or walk anywhere alone.
Reading quickly from a written statement, the teen remarked ... "one day I was a child and the next a victim."
"Have you ever felt worthless to the world because someone hurt you in a horrible way? I have," she stated.
While she no longer bears "the scratches of being dragged through the bushes, the internal ones will never go away," she said.
"I feel my life is spiraling out of control," she added.
The girl's mother said she feels helpless because "I just want to grab a hold of her and not let go, but she doesn't like to be touched."
Urging the court to impose a life sentence against Wilcox, the parent added, "I am just so proud of my daughter for standing up for herself and never once giving up on the justice system."
Also addressing the court Thursday was the teen's grandmother.
She said her granddaughter was always helping people in need and had hoped her "beautiful singing voice" might earn her a tryout on the American Idol program, "until that fateful night ... when the music died."
"No child should have to endure what my granddaughter went through," she told the judge.
Following his arrest, the pony-tailed suspect was declared mentally incompetent to stand trial, but earlier this year was adjudged rational enough to assist in his defense.
He claimed he was innocent of the charges and accepted a plea-bargain to avoid a potential life sentence.
Wilcox's attorney, William Short, Thursday said his client asked him to request a mid-term sentence.
Judge Kristen Lucena pointed to Wilcox's increasingly serious criminal record as a juvenile and adult and the vulnerability and degree of harm to his victim, in imposing the maximum 25-year prison term.
In ordering the four counts to run "full and consecutive," the judge pointed out that after raping the young girl twice, Wilcox would have had "a reasonable opportunity to reflect on his conduct ... but chose to move her to a more secluded area of the culvert to rape her again."
Wilcox was also fined $10,000 and will have to pay restitution to his victims in an amount yet to be determined.
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All you have to do is look at these cases. If the perp is a young or even older adult, he or she is most likely a repeat offender. The End.
Originally Posted by Ron_NYC
