Four Life Sentences for Texan Convicted of Raping, Filming 3-Month-Old Girl

A Texas court handed down four life sentences to a Montgomery County man convicted of repeatedly raping a three-month-old girl and filming the incidents. The sentence will keep the man behind bars without eligibility for parole for the remainder of his life.

Police in Montgomery County arrested David Vincent Akins, Jr, now 38, in 2016 after finding child pornography on his computer. Investigators determined some of the images were homemade. The examination of images revealed Akins took photos and videos of himself engaged in the sexual assault of a then three-month-old girl, the Houston Chronicle reported.

The attacks on the little girl occurred repeatedly through the first year of the infant’s life, prosecutors stated.

“There were a lot of other victims,”  Mary Nan Huffman, chief of the Internet Crimes Against Children Division in the District Attorney’s Office, told the Houston newspaper. “Akins went to juvenile detention when he was 14 years old for raping his 5-year-old sister. And when that happened, his other sister came forward with sexual assault allegations stating he had raped her since she was 3 years old. Both sisters testified during this trial, which was very powerful.”

Akins reportedly targeted single mothers with young children that he could victimize.

“He was very manipulative and good at picking his victims, which is what happened in this case,” Huffman explained.

The trial of the repeat sexual predator began on January 29. Two days later the jury handed down the guilty plea. Aikins elected to have 359th state District Court of Judge Kathleen Hamilton determine the sentence for his crimes. Judge Hamilton sentenced him to life in prison for each of the charges of sexual assault of a child and ordered the sentences to run consecutively.

Akins reportedly thanked the judge and prosecutors for giving him a fair trial while being led from the courtroom by Montgomery County sheriff’s deputies. He apologized to the court and the members of the jury for what they had to witness during the trial.

Defense attorney E Tay Bond complained the case took 536 days to come to trial.

“Whoever said confession is good for the soul is not a lawyer; this was a very difficult piece of evidence to overcome when Akins’ confession was corroborated with the video taped confession in this case,” Bond said. “We knew this would be a long day with the possibility of a life sentence without parole on the table. Hamilton made sure Akins will not return to society, stacking four life sentences to run consecutively.”