Cop sexually abused 15-year-old he met when she was doing school project in DC, feds say
A former Washington, D.C., police officer accused of sexually abusing a 15-year-old student he met when she was working on a school project nearly two decades ago is going to prison, federal prosecutors said.
In 2020, at age 29, the woman told her therapist that Lucius Kearney raped her years earlier, according to court documents. She revealed this to her therapist after seeing Kearney and his police patrol car parked in front of her neighbor’s home in 2020, court documents say.
She was “shocked” to encounter Kearney, an affidavit says, “but still mustered up the courage” to tell him: “I know you.”
Her therapist reported the sexual abuse allegation to the DC Child and Family Services Agency, according to the affidavit.
Kearney, now 52, of Washington, D.C., was sentenced on Dec. 10 to seven years and six months in prison on one count of first-degree sexual abuse of a child, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia said in a news release.
A jury found him guilty of the charge on Sept. 27, according to prosecutors.
In the courtroom, Kearney tearfully told D.C. Superior Court Judge Maribeth Raffinan that he’s innocent and that the woman wrongly identified him, The Washington Post reported.
“Ma’am, I did not do this. I am not a predator,” Kearney said, according to the newspaper. “I have five sisters. I was raised by a single mother, and I have a daughter. I would have never, ever hurt a child or a woman. That is not how I rock-and-roll.”
His defense attorney, Joseph L. Wright, told McClatchy News over the phone on Dec. 13 that Kearney’s sentencing “was a travesty of justice.”
Wright plans to file an appeal, he said.
Wright also said this was a “case of he said, she said,” and “to convict him on scant evidence presented should send a chill to every American.”
Kearney met the woman when she was a sophomore high school student during the 2005-2006 school year, according to prosecutors. He was a Fourth District Metropolitan Police Department Officer at the time.
They met while she visited the district’s police station to speak with him for a school project that involved interviewing someone about D.C., the affidavit says.
According to prosecutors, Kearney and the then-teenager “exchanged phone numbers and began communicating about the school project” before “their conversations turned sexual.”
Kearney sexually assaulted the girl in his truck near a D.C. public library, prosecutors said.
She had been volunteering at the library for community service hours at the time, according to prosecutors.
During Kearney’s trial, the woman said she had viewed her therapist’s disclosure of the alleged abuse, which she said happened multiple times, as a betrayal, The Washington Post reported
At sentencing, her attorney Julia Fuld read a two-page statement from the woman, who wrote the abuse was her “greatest fear and trauma,” according to The Washington Post.
“But I am no longer that scared 15-year-old girl. I am a woman and I am reclaiming my power,” her statement said. “I am dedicated to rebuilding my life of love, purpose and strength.”
Wright told McClatchy News that Kearney was sentenced to prison “because he was a police officer.”
“That was the resounding theme throughout the sentencing,” he said.
Kearney’s sentence will be followed by 10 years of supervised release, according to prosecutors.
He must register as a sex offender for 10 years, prosecutors said.
This story was originally published December 11, 2024 at 5:15 PM with the headline "Cop sexually abused 15-year-old he met when she was doing school project in DC, feds say."
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