Posted on 06/16/2004 9:25:09 AM PDT by NYer
SYRACUSE, N.Y. (AP) _ A father was sentenced to 50 years to life in prison Wednesday for raping his 11-year-old daughter, who later hung herself.
Timothy Lucie, 46, stood stoically as Onondaga County Judge William Walsh imposed back-to-back sentences of 25 years to life for his conviction on first-degree rape and first-degree sodomy charges. Lucie said nothing before Walsh sentenced him. His wife, Andrea Lucie, hurried from the courtroom in tears, refusing to talk to reporters. She testified in her husband's defense.
``In all my years on this planet, I've never been at a loss for words. Today, I am,'' Walsh said. ``My sentence will have to speak for me.'' Walsh said he would recommend that Lucie serve his sentence at the Clinton Correctional Facility, in a special program that isolates inmates who may be at risk from other prisoners because of the crimes they committed.
Lucie was convicted last month following an eight-day trial. He also was convicted of endangering the welfare of a child. He has appealed his conviction. Lucie was accused of sexually assaulting his daughter, Valerie, in the shower at their Syracuse home Sept. 30. Hours later her 8-year-old brother found her hanging from her bedpost by a dog collar and leash in what police said was an apparent suicide.
A furniture business owner, Lucie confessed to the rape after a six-hour interrogation on Oct. 13. He then recanted as police prepared to put the confession on videotape. Lucie claimed his confession was coerced by police, who he said threatened to arrest his wife and take away his four younger sons if he didn't admit to the sexual attack. Defense attorney Ken Moynihan had little to say, other than objecting to prosecutors' characterization that Lucie was not remorseful about this daughter's death.
Moynihan said Lucie ``deeply misses'' his daughter, but prosecutors never gave him the chance to properly grieve because they immediately made him the subject of a criminal investigation. Chief Assistant District Attorney Christine Garvey asked Walsh to give Lucie 50 years in prison, saying he ``deserved every second in state prison that this court can sentence him to.''
Garvey said there is typically a time at sentencing when family members are allowed to speak on behalf of the victim. ``But there is no one from Valerie Lucie's family to be that child's voice. It is truly sad. An 11-year-old is dead and she doesn't have anybody from her family _ not her aunts or her uncles, or her grandparents, to say what a wonderful child she was, how she was loved and how she will be missed,'' Garvey said.
Instead, Garvey read a short letter composed by Leslie Plucknette, Valerie's former third-grade teacher at Fairbanks Road Elementary School in the Churchville-Chili School District near Rochester. Plucknette sat through the entire trial and was in her usual second-row seat for Wednesday's sentencing. Plucknette's letter described Valerie as an engaging, excitable child, ``a petite, little girl with a smile as wide as her braids were long.'' Plucknette said Valerie ``sang with the voice of an angel,'' and was the star of her third-grade class' performance of ``Charlotte's Web.''
After court, Plucknette stood in the hallway, showing off a photograph of Valerie at a party with some friends. ``If he stays in jail for 50 years, that would be justice,'' she said.
Several jurors also attended the sentencing. Foreman Michael Spado said he, too, was there for Valerie. ``That poor little girl only had 11 years. Fifty years is a satisfactory sentence but it can't bring Valerie back,'' Spado said. Spado said the jury was not allowed to consider Valerie's death as it deliberated the case. However, Spado said he personally held Lucie responsible for Valerie's death.
AP-ES-06-16-04 1209EDT
Oh dear God, that poor girl...
As sad as this case is, it's comforting to know the Lord has her now...and she's at peace.
Headline should have read "hanged", not "hung".
Personally this begins to look more like a witchhunt.
How ironic that a sex perv gets to serve his sentence at the CLINTON Correctional Facility.
ping to my post above.
Is the Clinton Correctional Facility the place ClintBilly went to...ahem... to straighten things out? :0)
If the coroner did not mess up the evidence. Or the child did not wash it away. Or the evidence did not support the DA’s case.
These things and others could have made it advantageous not to bring up physical evidence.
ping to my post above. No DNA and no semen. I have trouble buying this one in light of those statements.
"Moynihan reminded the jury of the lack of physical evidence directly linking Lucie to the sexual assault of Valerie.
In a continued effort to incite reasonable doubt, he said the injuries on Valerie’s body could have been caused by something other than rape and sodomy.
“If it’s consistent with self-inflicted injury, that would also explain why there’s no physical evidence – there’s no semen, DNA, hairs, fibers,” said Moynihan."
http://www.news10now.com/content/all%5Fnews/?ArID=19982&SecID=83
Crushing. Heartbreaking.
Perhaps there was not enough dna.
awful. I am at a loss for words.
Considering that the Clinton Correctional Facility is a maximum security facility, he will not be having a very nice time during his stay.
Once the general population gets wind of what he did, it will then get even worse.
I'm sure this creep will be segregated from the others, simply to save his own life.
Very weird!
The article doesn't say it, but I imagine there WAS a lot more evidence. Not trying to be crude here, but an adult male would probably cause some tearing in a child that small upon penetration, especially if sodomy was involved. My mother is a retired nurse who was the communicable disease nurse for our county. She had a prisoner in a minimum security prison suspected to have AIDS that she had to visit. He was emotionally screwed up & she had a doctor examine him, whereupon the report stated his rectum was 3 times larger than it should have been. In other words, he had SOMETHING up there that wasn't supposed to be there. My point is that if a grown man shows signs of sodomy that obvious, imagine what something like that would do to a small child. On second thought, it's probably best NOT to try to imagine that!
Anyway, there may not have been DNA evidence because he may have "pulled out" prior to ejaculation and, being in a shower, other evidence of contact could have been washed away. There are a number of things that could have affected the evidence. Besides, the reality isn't anything like CSI where they all but wave a magic wand and evidence appears. It is much harder than you might think, especially when a sick bastard really wants to cover it up. When you factor in the lawyer, who will try to get all kinds of evidence dismissed (look at Kobe Bryant's team and what they are doing) and there may have been some DNA evidence that the jury didn't get to see. The judge would have seen it and his reaction tells me he knows this prick did it.
I will agree with you, though, in that if this is all they had on the guy, it would have been difficult for me to convict him. But a jury DID convict him and some jurors even showed up at the sentencing, so that tells me there may have been more to this than the story tells.
What if a condom were used?That could lead to no semen.
Calling this guy A Father, is an insult to everything this title stands for. He may have sired his helpless young victem, but A Father he ain't!
I supose that 50 years for this crime is about as good as liberal dominated New York can muster, but it ain't nearly enough! Death by hanging, just as his victem chose in her shame, dissappointment and grief over being betrayed by the very one that little girls look to for refuge, comfort, and guidance, ain't enough either, but it would better indicate that just maybe, the law considered her life at least as precious as her assailant's.
I'm inclined to agree with you on the facts as they are presented here but and it's a big but - A jury of his peers convicted him and they were privy to much more information than we have here. The jury system is far from perfect but it's the best there is anywhere.
If he is truly innocent maybe he will win on appeal. If he's guilty he got what he deserved. - just my opinion.
Guess again.
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