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50 years for air force rapes
01/03/2007 13:17 - (SA)
Florida - A military jury sentenced an air force captain to 50 years in prison for raping four men and attempting to rape two others.
The sentence was delivered on Wednesday, a day after nine air force officers serving on captain Devery L Taylor's court-martial jury found him guilty of all charges against him for drugging and kidnapping servicemen and others he met in bars. Taylor was dismissed from the air force and will not be eligible for parole for 20 years.
Earlier on Wednesday, the 38-year-old former hospital administrator asked jurors to consider a sentence of 10 years. His civilian attorney, Martin Regan, said Taylor had no criminal history and an outstanding military record in his four years of service.
Taylor was convicted of two counts of attempted sodomy, four counts of forcible sodomy, two counts of kidnapping and one count of unlawful entry.
"Each of these victims met the accused only briefly, but they will suffer the rest of their lives," said captain Eveylon Westbrook, a military prosecutor.
Taylor had testified that he had consensual sex with five of the men and that the sixth, who is openly gay, raped him. Taylor's attorney said the men lied to protect their military careers.
"I want you to know how much I have loved being a part of the air force and serving this country. It has been difficult for me to be a part of the military and be who I am, which is a homosexual," Taylor said in a written statement read on Wednesday by a military defence attorney assisting in the case.
Taylor said he feared he was the victim of a "gay round up" when military investigators interviewed him in 2006 and that that is why he did not fully answer their questions in a five-hour videotaped interview.
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