More judges like this needed..

[Steff]

http://denverpost.com/news/ci_2843663

 

Brents' rampage nets 1,300 years

Victims confront "pure evil" as serial rapist is sentenced in plea deal

By Amy Herdy

Denver Post Staff Writer

 

 

 

 

Serial rapist Brent J. Brents is escorted from Denver District Court after being sentenced to over 1,300 years for 66 counts. (Post / Glenn Asakawa)

 

 

Brent J. Brents was sentenced to more than 1,300 years in prison Wednesday for crimes a judge said showed "unspeakable cruelty and malignance."

 

"These are extraordinary crimes," Denver district Judge Robert S. Hyatt said to Brents, whose gaze did not waver from Hyatt's. "You stalked these victims, assaulted these victims, and you degraded these victims ... at every stage."

 

Fearing he would be killed in a Colorado prison, Brents, 36, agreed to plead guilty in exchange for serving his time out of state. The charges included attempted murder, sexual assault, kidnapping, child abuse, sexual assault of a child, menacing, burglary and robbery.

 

They are related to crimes Brents admitted he committed against a dozen victims between Oct. 20 and Feb. 18. Most of his 66 sentences are to be served consecutively, which means one has to be completed before another starts and that he will likely spend the rest of his life in prison.

 

"It's the task of this court today to ensure you will never be free again," Hyatt said.

 

In a series of letters sent to a Denver Post reporter from March

ONLINE EXTRA

Letters from Brent Brents

Click here for Brent Brents' June 13 letter.

 

Click here for Brent Brents' letter to his victims and their families.

 

 

 

 

 

through last week, Brents apologized to his victims, detailed some of his horrific acts and attempted to explain the personal demons that drove him.

 

He expressed regret for the "violence, pain, hurt, (sorrow) and lies" he inflicted upon his victims and their families. "My actions were cowardly and wrong," he wrote.

 

He repeated his claim that he had been sexually and emotionally abused as a child, something that his defense attorney, Carrie Thompson, reiterated in court Wednesday. The sexual abuse continued until Brents was sent to juvenile detention at the age of 12 for rape, Thompson said.

 

Brents was arrested in February after a spree that included the sexual assaults of a grandmother and her two granddaughters. He was able to elude police and was eventually caught in Glenwood Springs after a statewide manhunt.

 

On Wednesday, Brents declined to give a statement in court, other than briefly answering the judge's questions. Showing no emotion, he responded with "guilty" when asked how he would plead to every charge.

 

His mother could not be reached Wednesday. In previous interviews, she has repeatedly said Brents was not abused as a child.

 

Before he was sentenced, three of Brents' victims spoke of how their lives are marred by pain and fear.

 

"I will never be the same again," one victim yelled at Brents as she turned to face the man who kidnapped, raped and robbed her Feb. 11.

 

"You are pure evil," said another victim whom Brents kidnapped, raped and robbed that same day.

 

The woman said she hopes that in prison Brents experiences "sheer terror, and crumbles from weakness."

 

As property manager Tiffany Engle, whom Brents nearly beat to death with a two-by- four Feb. 18, spoke, his eyes filled with tears. When Engle, who underwent brain surgery for injuries caused by the attack, began to sob and had to stop speaking for a few moments to compose herself, Brents hung his head and cried.

 

"Your soul's going to rot for eternity," Engle told Brents, who stared back at her.

 

In repeated letters to The Post, Brents said there are some crimes for which he has no remorse. Many crimes, he said, he simply does not remember.

 

During those, he said, he would "black out" only to awaken to realize he was hurting someone. That's what he said happened with Engle, he said.

"She haunts me more than anybody," Brents said. "I blacked out, and when I came to, this beautiful woman was laying next to me, and she wasn't beautiful anymore."

 

Thompson, Brents' attorney, told the court that Brents "recognizes the horror of his acts" and that one reason he asked for the plea bargain was to spare his victims and their families any more pain.

 

"He is a damaged human being," Thompson said, "but the damage is not from pure evil."

 

When Brents was a child, Thomp son said, "horrific acts were committed upon him. ..."

 

"I feel despair and sadness for what he went through and that he can no longer control his anger," she said. "But it's very, very important to understand his story, how he got here. This was a societal failure."

 

District Attorney Mitch Morrissey said Thompson's explanation was wrong.

 

"He was given the opportunity for rehab in prison, which he chose not to attend. He chose not to accept parole because of the conditions that go with it. He's a sociopath," Morrissey said.

 

"The idea that he doesn't understand what he did is astonishing to me after listening to the statements he made," Morrissey continued. "He's responsible for what he did. He was clear on what he did and just didn't care."

 

Hyatt said he tried to make sure the sentence represented every one of Brents' victims.

 

"This sentence will be unlike any sentence I have imposed in more than two decades on the bench," the judge said. "Your relentless pursuit of these victims - daily, hourly - was nothing less than an ongoing horror."

 

Hyatt said he reviewed Brents' psychiatric report but could not understand how he had become the man he is today.

 

"You are far beyond any potential rehabilitation," the judge said. "You must simply be kept apart from society."

 

Denver Post staff writer Mike McPhee and researcher Barbara Hudson contributed to this report.