A girl who testified that an East Chicago man pulled her into his apartment and molested her told a deputy prosecutor she didn’t feel comfortable delivering a victim-impact statement in person.
The girl, who was 11 at the time of the molestation, instead wrote a letter that deputy prosecutor Nadia Chivers read aloud in court Friday. “This experience has changed my life,” the girl wrote. The girl said she suffers from nightmares and finds it difficult to trust any man around her. “I see his face and remember what he did,” she wrote. “No little girl should have to go through what I went through. I think he should be in jail for a long time.”
At the trial in June, the girl burst into tears and cried for her mother when she testified against Edward Lee Smith Sr., who was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison for child molesting and criminal confinement.
Smith, 46, said he plans to appeal the sentence and the jury verdict.
Evidence presented at his trial showed that on July 26, 2013, the girl was waiting for her friend in the hallway of an apartment building in the 3800 block of Ontario Court when Smith grabbed her by the arm, pulled her into his apartment and took her into his son’s bedroom where she was molested.
Chivers argued for a six-year prison sentence on each of the charges, served consecutively.
Defense attorney John Cantrell said argued for leniency. He said his client has one prior felony conviction and one misdemeanor.
Lake Superior Court Judge Salvador Vasquez said he found no mitigating factors in deciding the sentence. “This was a very predatory act,” Vasquez said, calling Smith’s actions “pathetically horrible.”
As a result of his conviction, Vasquez said Smith must register as a sex offender for life.
Ruth Ann Krause is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
