You turned this girl's haven into hell, judge tells rapist

YOUNGSTOWN

Judge Shirley Christian told a man she was sentencing Thursday on eight counts of child rape that he turned the victim’s haven into a hell.

“A home for a young child is supposed to be a safe haven,” Judge Christian told Brian Griffin, 26, of Warren, just before she handed down eight consecutive life sentences in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court. “Instead, it was a living hell.”

Griffin was convicted Feb. 24 by a jury of having sexual contact with a child who was 8 years old at the time the abuse started – from Feb. 1, 2012, to May 31, 2013, at a home in Campbell. Assistant Prosecutor Jennifer McLaughlin said Griffin was a relative of the family who was staying in the girl’s home.

The jury convicted Griffin of eight counts of rape and eight counts of gross sexual imposition, but Judge Christian found that the later charges were part of the same course of conduct and merged them with the rape counts. The case was indicted in 2014 after an investigation by Campbell police, who were informed of the abuse by the victim’s mother.

Read more about the case in Friday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.