A 10-year-old girl walked confidently across the courtroom and stood near an assistant prosecutor.
Several feet away was Dennis L. Menefee, the 46-year-old who abducted and sexually assaulted her on Sept. 26 while she was walking home from the Massillon Public Library. Menefee was moments away from pleading guilty to rape and other charges.
Menefee, was about to be sentenced to life in prison with no chance for early release plus an additional 26 years.
Before Stark County Common Pleas Judge Kristin Farmer accepted the plea agreement and sentenced Menefee, Fred Scott, an assistant Stark County prosecutor, read a statement on behalf of the girl.
“I was walking home from the library and (Menefee) pulled up to me,” the statement began. “He said he was a cop and said people were calling the police saying I was a runaway... He was too close and he grabbed me. He threw me in the truck and drove off to a parking lot behind a (restaurant). I ... tried pushing him off and fighting him. But he was too heavy and started punching me.”
Menefee raped her and threatened to kill the girl if she told anybody. The victim described the black eyes and bruises she suffered as well as her favorite outfit being ruined with blood.
She walked home tired, on the verge of passing out. And “even now,” she wrote, “I still have nightmares and I can’t even go across the street to play with my friends without worrying that this is going to happen again. I haven’t walked to the store or the library again because any car that comes near me, I get really scared.”
The intensity of the written statement continued: “I really hope people in prison do to you what you did to me. I hope you rot in the place you belong, prison.”
Menefee avoided a trial set for July by pleading guilty to the rape counts plus a charge of having a weapon under disability. Attached to the charges were sexually violent predator, repeat violent offender and firearm specifications.
He forced the girl into a truck near Cherry Road and Second Street NE, according to court records. The girl had told investigators that her abductor had been wearing a traffic vest. A firearm and handcuffs were on the seat of the vehicle, police said. The girl described her attacker’s vehicle to police, leading to his arrest.
Menefee received the maximum punishment under the law, Scott said. Farmer sentenced the defendant to two life prison terms with no chance of parole on each of the rape counts; the additional 26 years is related to the weapons charge and specifications.
A kidnapping charge was dismissed as part of the plea agreement reached between the prosecutor’s office and Menefee and his attorney, Wayne Graham. Scott handled the case with co-counsel and fellow Assistant Prosecutor Daniel Petricini.
“I’m extremely pleased with the result of this case,” Scott said. The sentence “assures that (Menefee) will never leave prison.”
And the child victim “didn’t have to relive (the abduction and rape) again in front of strangers (during trial testimony).”
