Jury convicts Tarentum man of sexually assaulting child

A Tarentum man will remain in jail until he is sentenced in December after being convicted Monday of child sexual assault.

A jury found Brian Jefferies, 27, guilty on all charges that he sexually assaulted the victim multiple times.

The defense attorney told jurors that the prosecution’s case was so riddled with reasonable doubt that they had to acquit her client of sexually assaulting a 6-year-old.

But the prosecutor said that argument was merely an attempt to distract from a fundamental truth: “The defendant, Brian Jefferies, likes children. He’s attracted to them.”

The jurors were clearly swayed Monday by the latter argument.

The jury reached its verdict in the afternoon about an hour after retiring to deliberate.

Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Jill E. Rangos will sentence Jefferies on Dec. 12. He faces a mandatory minimum of at least 10 years in prison.

Jefferies was immediately taken into custody and will be held at Allegheny County Jail pending sentencing.

His trial, on charges of aggravated indecent assault of a child, unlawful contact and related counts stemming from a series of incidents last year, began last week before a jury of seven women and five men.

It featured testimony from the victim, now 8, as well the defendant, who denied having assaulted the child.

Allegheny County Police charged Jefferies on April 28, 2023, after the victim disclosed the abuse to a family member and a teacher.

He later was charged with rape and involuntary deviate sexual intercourse in an unrelated case from 10 years ago involving a different alleged victim, who was a minor at the time. That case is listed for a jury trial but is not yet scheduled.

During her closing argument Monday, Carissa Davenport, Jefferies’ attorney, told the jury that the victim was lying.

“Secrets are what this case is all about,” Davenport said. “Secrets and lies and desperation.”

She highlighted inconsistencies in the prosecution’s case, including that the victim testified about being recorded by Jefferies on video even though no such evidence was presented to the jury and no such video was found on his cellphone.

“The story didn’t make sense,” Davenport said.

The defense also decried the lack of physical evidence and was critical of the prosecution for failing to call doctors who examined the victim.

“The government — they aren’t concerned with the truth. They are concerned with a conviction,” Davenport said.

She urged the jurors to tell the prosecution their case was not good enough.

“The law does not say that you must believe this child.”

But during her closing Monday, Deputy District Attorney Lisa Carey cracked back at the defense, saying they were trying to distract the jurors from the truth.

“You can hear what (the victim) reported on April 21, 2023, and compare it to what you heard with your own eyes and ears,” Carey said of the victim’s testimony last week.

She urged the jurors to watch the victim’s forensic interview during which they described the assault.

“Adults can come up with pretty complex lies,” Carey said. “I would suggest to you, 6-year-olds can’t.”