SPARTANBURG COUNTY MAN RECEIVES LIFE PRISON SENTENCE FOR SEXUAL ASSAULT ON A CHILD

A Spartanburg County man received a life prison sentence today after a jury decided that he sexually assaulted a 9-year-old relative.

The jury deliberated for about an hour before deciding that John D. Stewart, 45, was guilty of criminal sexual conduct with a minor. Circuit Judge Roger Couch sentenced Stewart in accordance with the state’s two-strike/three-strike law for repeat violent offenders.

“Mr. Stewart received a penalty that is richly deserved,” Assistant Solicitor Tony Leibert said. “He not get another chance to molest a child.”

The assault occurred Feb. 16, 2002 at a North Church Street home. Stewart, an invited guest in the home, inappropriately touched the 9-year-old girl while she slept. The child reported the incident to her mother minutes after the crime occurred. The child described the crime in detail when she spoke to deputies from the Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office.

Leibert based his case off the testimony of the victim, her mother, a sheriff’s deputy, an emergency room doctor and a therapist from the Children’s Advocacy Center.

Stewart’s criminal record includes convictions for assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature, possession of cocaine, attempted armed robbery, strong-arm robbery and malicious injury to personal property.

Stewart will have to serve every day of the prison sentence.