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“You and Mr. [Assistant Bergen County Prosecutor David] Calviello are going to federal prison,” Ivan McKinney, 40, shouted at Superior Court Judge James J. Guida in Hackensack, before county sheriff’s officers shackled him and escorted him out of the courtroom.
At that point, McKinney’s 70-year-old father, Fred, began shouting from the back: “Don’t beat him up. Don’t manhandle him!”
TOP: Gladys & Fred McKinney, BOTTOM: Defense attorney Jeff Steinfeld, Ivan McKinney
The officers didn’t.
Technically, Guida sentenced McKinney to life plus 24 years with parole eligibility in the year 2067.
In determining the sentence, Guida said he found that it wasn’t just a risk but a certainty that McKinney — already a previously convicted sex offender on lifetime parole for preying on underage girls — would strike again.
“This defendant needs to be removed from society,” the judge said.
Although McKinney’s insistence that the latest incident was happenstance, Guida said he clearly planned it. He also rejected defense attorney Jeffrey B. Steinfeld’s argument that there was no harm against either the 13-year-old or another girl, 15, who prosecutors said was with them.
“The court finds a child who is sexually assaulted is, per se, seriously harmed,” Guida said.
Steinfeld said that McKinney will appeal the verdict and sentence on several grounds, including that DNA evidence existed implicating another man.
McKinney’s family submitted letters, asking the judge for another chance.
Guida, in turn, said: “What they probably don’t realize is that this is his fourth chance.”
McKinney was released in August 2010 on lifetime parole after serving 19 months in state prison for sexually assaulting two Passaic County teens after getting them drunk.
McKinney was convicted of sexual assault in 2008 after the girls said he picked them up in Clifton, took them shopping, brought them to a Route 3 motel and had sex with them before taking them home, according to state criminal records. He was also convicted of cruelty and neglect for similar incidents involving young girls in Hackensack, records show.
The new case arose six months later.
This time around, authorities said, McKinney picked up the two girls in Passaic County and took them to his Hackensack apartment. After discovering what happened, Clifton police contacted their counterparts in Hackensack, who alerted the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office Sex Crimes/Child Abuse Unit.
Following a trial, jurors in February convicted McKinney of a dozen counts in a 15-count indictment, including four of causing harm to underage children.
Others included kidnapping the 13-year-old by “removing her a substantial distance without permission of a parent” and multiple counts of raping each girl when they were incapacitated, as well as impairing the morals of a minor.
Jurors convicted him of all of the counts except for aggravated sexual assault and sexual assault of the 15-year-old.
“I still maintain my innocence,” McKinney told Guida during a lengthy statement today in which he also accused jurors of sleeping during his trial and said evidence was overlooked. He didn’t specify what that purported evidence was.
At one point, McKinney thanked his entire family by name, as well as Guida and sheriff’s officers, among others, while sobbing.
His demeanor changed, however, after Guida pronounced the sentence.
STORY / PHOTOS: Mary K. Miraglia, CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter
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BACKGROUND:
Hackensack man convicted of raping girl, 13
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: Jurors this afternoon convicted a Hackensack man accused of raping two teenagers after plying them with alcohol and drugs. READ MORE….
Judge denies new trial to Hackensack man convicted of raping girl
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: A judge in Hackensack today denied a request for a new trial for a city man convicted four months ago of raping two teenagers after plying them with alcohol and drugs. READ MORE….
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