Deaf man sentenced to 30 years for rape of teenager; Odenton; Pedestrian killed in crash

A 43-year-old deaf man was sentenced to 30 years in prison Tuesday after he was found guilty of multiple offenses related to the sexual assault of a 15-year-old girl.

Demetrius Troy Wallace, of Brooklyn, was sentenced by Anne Arundel County Circuit Court Judge Michael Wachs after a jury found Wallace guilty of several sex offenses in July.

Wallace was arrested in November 2015 after a student at a local high school told law enforcement a classmate had been abused by someone close to her. Capital Gazette is not naming the student or school to protect the identity of the victim.

Court records showed Wallace was indicted by a grand jury on 24 sex crimes alleged to have occurred between November 2014 and August 2015. Wallace was found guilty of three counts of second degree rape, two counts of second degree sex offense and one count of sex offense of a minor.

Catherine Woolley, Wallace's defense attorney, said following his conviction that she'd planned to appeal. She did not immediately return a request for comment Wednesday.

Woolley had accused the court of not properly addressing issues with Wallace's hearing loss, saying it interfered with his ability to participate in the trial. A spokeswoman for the state's attorney's office said a court-appointed translator aided Wallace throughout the proceedings.

Woolley had accused the court of not properly addressing issues with Wallace's hearing loss, saying it interfered with his ability to participate in the trial.

A spokeswoman for the state's attorney's office said a court-appointed translator aided Wallace throughout the proceedings.

Prosecutors dropped charges in a separate case where Wallace was alleged to have sexually abused another minor who was either a housemate or family member.

Online court records show the abuse was alleged to have occurred between March 1, 2016, and Aug. 21, 2016.

In a statement, State's Attorney Wes Adams said both victims were "satisfied with the 30-year sentence Wallace received for his abuses."

"As my Assistant State's Attorney, Anastasia Prigge, stated for the record, the victims were present in the courtroom, were satisfied justice was served, and we did not wish to further traumatize these two young victims," Adams wrote in an email.

Odenton

Pedestrian killed in crash

A 53-year-old man was killed in a fatal crash in Odenton on Tuesday night.

Anne Arundel police said officers responded to a report of a crash involving a pedestrian on Crain Highway and Wellfleet Lane at 10:39 p.m.

Officers found that Jessica Rachelle Mcpeters, 24, of Severna Park, was driving her 2016 Honda CR-V northbound on Crain Highway when she struck Virgilios Torres Pineda, of Crofton.

Police said Pineda was wearing all dark clothing at the time of the crash and "walked directly into the path" of Mcpeters' vehicle. Pineda was pronounced dead at the scene while Mcpeters did not suffer any injuries.

Investigators say Pineda was at fault for the crash and believe that he may have been inebriated at the time.

Pineda's body was sent to the Chief Medical Examiner's Office in Baltimore for an autopsy, police said.

Credit: By Phil Davis - pdavis@capgaznews.com