Judge calls Philadelphia man who sexually assaulted Bucks teen at gunpoint more ‘mean-spirited’ than killers
Prosecutors in Bucks County said Kyle Lamar Black engaged in torturous, sadistic behavior.
An East Frankford man will spend more than a decade in prison for the violent, gunpoint sexual assault of a 15-year-old Bucks County girl.
Kyle Lamar Black, 20, was sentenced Thursday to 11½ to 22 years in prison for the crime, which took place in Bristol Township in May 2018. Black also faces 10 years of probation after his release, and must register as a sex offender for 25 years, according to court records.
“The conduct that the defendant engaged in that night was torturous. It was sadistic,” Deputy District Attorney Matthew S. Lannetti, the lead prosecutor, said in a statement. “Not only did he rob and sexually assault her. He relished in robbing and sexually assaulting her.”
Black was initially charged with rape and involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, among other offenses. But a jury acquitted him of the more serious crimes at his October trial, instead convicting him of robbery, indecent assault, and burglary.
His attorney, David Knight, said Thursday that Black apologized to his victim and wished her no ill will, but had no “good explanation” for his action.
“He and his family were very happy the jury found him not guilty of the most serious charge,” Knight said. “I think they all realize, for what he did do, he’d have to face a significant penalty, which he did today.”
Investigators said that on the night of the assault, Black, then 18, went with two other teens to the victim’s home in Bristol Township. There, Black demanded that the victim pay him gas money for giving a ride to her ex-boyfriend, one of the teens who accompanied him.
When she refused, Black held the girl at gunpoint and forced her to perform a sexual act, according to the affidavit of probable cause for his arrest. Afterward, the group attacked the teen, dumped garbage on her, and forcibly cut her hair, the affidavit said. Her iPhone was taken from her at gunpoint.
“This is always going to be part of our family,” the victim’s mother said during the sentencing hearing Thursday. “We can put it behind us, but we can never forget it.”
In handing down her sentence Thursday, County Judge Diane Gibbons admonished Black, saying she had known “people shoot and kill people that weren’t as mean-spirited as this.”