Ex-Oklahoma officer sentenced for rape, sex crimes
OKLAHOMA CITY -- A former police officer convicted of raping and sexually victimizing women while on his beat in a low-income Oklahoma City neighborhood was sentenced today to 263 years in prison.
Jurors last month convicted 29-year-old Daniel Holtzclaw on on 18 counts - four counts of first-degree rape, plus additional counts of forcible oral sodomy, sexual battery, procuring lewd exhibition and second-degree rape. He was acquitted on 18 other counts.
Holtzclaw's attorneys indicated to CBS affiliate KWTV that he plans to appeal.
Prosecutors said Holtzclaw preyed on black women he interacted with on his beat in a low-income neighborhood near the state Capitol. During the month-long trial, 13 women testified against him, and several said Holtzclaw stopped them while out on patrol, searched them for outstanding warrants or checked to see if they were carrying drug paraphernalia, then forced himself on them.
All of the accusers were black. Holtzclaw is half-white, half-Japanese. Holtzclaw's attorney, meanwhile, described the former college football star as a model officer whose attempts to help the drug addicts and prostitutes he came in contact with were distorted.
Defense lawyer Scott Adams also attacked the credibility of some of the women, who had arrest records and histories of drug abuse, noting that many didn't come forward until police had already identified them as possible victims after launching their investigation.
Several of Holtzclaw's victims have filed civil lawsuits against Holtzclaw and the city in state and federal court.
"I so desperately want my life back - the life I had beforehe took it away," Jannie Ligons, one of the victims ofHoltzclaw, told the court in an impact statement.
The judge denied a defense motion filed a day earlierseeking a new trial.
The Associated Press highlighted Holtzclaw's case in a yearlong examination of sexual misconduct by law officers, which found that about 1,000 officers in the U.S. lost their licenses for sex crimes or other sexual misconduct over a six-year period.
Those figures are likely an undercount, because not every state has a process to ban problem officers from law enforcement. In states that do decertify officers, reporting requirements vary.