Man who sexually assaulted young family member sentenced to 8 years
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| Samuel Mendy Israel |
A Brooklyn man who admitted to sexually assaulting a 10-year-old family member was sentenced to 8 years in prison Wednesday, but not before the woman he preyed on confronted him over the years of abuse.
“He has absolutely no morals,” Samuel Israel’s now-grown victim told the packed courtroom, as her abuser hung his head at the defense table, avoiding eye contact.
“He stole my innocence, and my childhood. I was 10-years-old at the time he started to sexually abuse me. He groomed me to the point where I didn’t know it was wrong or, at 10-years-old, how sick it was,” she stated.
The woman, who is now married with two children, said Israel molested her until she was 16, taking her on trips with his family and buying her silence with lavish gifts. She told Judge Matthew D’Emic she felt alienated from her peers, because while they were talking about school or their weekend plans, Israel “was having oral sex with me.”
“I felt like it was my fault,” she said “I felt dirty.”
Israel, who declined to speak before sentencing, pleaded guilty to charges of criminal sex act and witness tampering in July in exchange for the lesser sentence.
He also confessed to hiring onetime reality TV gumshoe Vincent Parco to try to scare his victim out of taking the stand.
Israel was led out in handcuffs Wednesday after D’Emic sentenced him to 8 years behind bars. He’d faced up to 25 years in prison prior to cutting the deal.
Defense attorney Susan Necheles declined to comment on Israel’s behalf as she left court.
Prosecutors say Israel paid Parco $17,000, and in turn the P.I. set up video cameras in hotel rooms, and plied the victim’s relatives with hookers in order to record them in compromising situations.
Israel was originally scheduled to head to trial on the sex assault case in June 2017, but two days before jury selection, a stranger approached a member of the victim’s family to show him footage of another relative having sex with a prostitute, and warned him against cooperating.
But the relative went to authorities, and videos of the blackmail tryst were found on Parco’s computer, prosecutors said.
Parco, who starred on two seasons of the reality show Parco P.I., remains charged with various counts of unlawful surveillance and promoting prostitution.
“He has absolutely no morals,” Samuel Israel’s now-grown victim told the packed courtroom, as her abuser hung his head at the defense table, avoiding eye contact.
“He stole my innocence, and my childhood. I was 10-years-old at the time he started to sexually abuse me. He groomed me to the point where I didn’t know it was wrong or, at 10-years-old, how sick it was,” she stated.
The woman, who is now married with two children, said Israel molested her until she was 16, taking her on trips with his family and buying her silence with lavish gifts. She told Judge Matthew D’Emic she felt alienated from her peers, because while they were talking about school or their weekend plans, Israel “was having oral sex with me.”
“I felt like it was my fault,” she said “I felt dirty.”
Israel, who declined to speak before sentencing, pleaded guilty to charges of criminal sex act and witness tampering in July in exchange for the lesser sentence.
He also confessed to hiring onetime reality TV gumshoe Vincent Parco to try to scare his victim out of taking the stand.
Israel was led out in handcuffs Wednesday after D’Emic sentenced him to 8 years behind bars. He’d faced up to 25 years in prison prior to cutting the deal.
Defense attorney Susan Necheles declined to comment on Israel’s behalf as she left court.
Prosecutors say Israel paid Parco $17,000, and in turn the P.I. set up video cameras in hotel rooms, and plied the victim’s relatives with hookers in order to record them in compromising situations.
Israel was originally scheduled to head to trial on the sex assault case in June 2017, but two days before jury selection, a stranger approached a member of the victim’s family to show him footage of another relative having sex with a prostitute, and warned him against cooperating.
But the relative went to authorities, and videos of the blackmail tryst were found on Parco’s computer, prosecutors said.
Parco, who starred on two seasons of the reality show Parco P.I., remains charged with various counts of unlawful surveillance and promoting prostitution.