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Press Release

Alabama Man Sentenced to 55 Years for Aggravated Sexual Abuse of a Child

For Immediate Release
Office of Public Affairs

An Alabama man was sentenced today to 660 months in prison and a lifetime term of supervised release for his aggravated sexual abuse of a child under the age of 12, announced Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Joyce White Vance of the Northern District of Alabama.

Rick Lee Evans, 43, a truck driver from Talladega, Alabama, was convicted by a federal jury on Dec. 11, 2015, of one count of aggravated sexual abuse of a child under 12.  

According to the evidence introduced at trial, Evans, a former U.S. Army soldier, and his then-wife, a Department of Defense employee, were residing in Germany when they were asked to take temporary custody of a five-year-old child whose parents were deployed to Iraq with the U.S. Army.  Trial evidence showed that from May 2007 to December 2008, while the child lived with Evans, he sexually abused the child on multiple occasions. 

Trial Attorney Austin M. Berry of the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS) and Assistant U.S. Attorney Jacquelyn Hutzell of the Northern District of Alabama prosecuted the case. U.S. Army Criminal Investigations Division and the FBI’s Birmingham, Alabama, Division investigated the case.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice.  Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and CEOS, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims.  For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.

Updated March 16, 2016

Topic
Project Safe Childhood
Press Release Number: 16-297