Peabody man found guilty of child rape in retrial

SALEM – The retrial of a Peabody man charged with repeatedly raping and fondling two young girls, ages 7 and 10, at a South Peabody home in 2000 has resulted in another guilty verdict.Randy Roby, 46, who has been living in Westborough, was found guilty Monday afternoon in Salem Superior Court of two counts of rape of a child and three counts of indecent assault and battery on a child under age 14.The girls were 7 and 10 when the incidents first began at a home on Tuckers Court in South Peabody in 2000 and 2001.The jury, comprised of one woman and 11 men deliberated for about four hours before returning their decision.Roby was immediately sentenced to serve 12-to-16-years in state prison by Judge Howard J. Whitehead.When Roby gets out of prison he will then be on probation for another 10 years and will be monitored by a GPS tracking device.”Sexual abuse of children is devastating to the life of a child. The girls will never be the same, but hopefully they will recover,” Whitehead noted as he handed down the punishment asked by Assistant District Attorney Karen H. Hopwood.Whitehead had reduced three of the rape charges Roby was initially charged with to indecent assault and battery on a child under age 14 after defense lawyer Kirk Bransfield argued that the commonwealth had not proven those three charges against his client. The judge also agreed that the two remaining rape charges were not by force.The oldest victim, now 19, testified she was digitally raped beginning when she was 10 until age 11 at her grandmother’s home in the dining room and bedroom and that it happened more than 10 times.The younger girl, now 15, told of her sexual abuse that began when she was 7 until she was 8 and that the sexual fondling occurred in the basement, dining room and exercise room of the home.Both girls said they were shown pornography on his computer.The incidents were disclosed to their mother in 2001.In asking for the punishment, Hopwood said it was based on Roby’s conduct and sexual assault on the girls.Hopwood said in her closing summation that Roby “used his position of authority” on them, recognizing his size, age, and as the boyfriend of their grandmother, and they were scared.Defense lawyer Kirk Bransfield, who insisted that his client was innocent during his closing summation, pleaded for a more lenient punishment, suggesting three-to-four years in prison with probation.He pointed out to Whitehead that Roby, who works as a research development engineer, has been gainfully employed, been living with his wife and daughter in Westborough and has had minimal court involvement.Roby took the stand in his own defense during the trial, vehemently denying the charges, saying they were not true, but the jury felt otherwise.The mother of the two victims, who are now ages 15 and 19, testified telling Whitehead the impact the incidents have had on her family, the struggle they have had to endure and how her family literally has been torn apart.Roby must register as a sex offender when he gets out of jail and is not to have any contact with his accusers, their mother or their family and he is to have no unsupervised contact with children under the age of 16 as part of his probationary conditions.Roby was first convicted in 2003 of five counts of rape of a child with force and was then also given 12-to-16-years in prison, but he was granted a new trial and has been free on bail since then.Roby will receive credit for the time he had already served in prison on his first conviction.Peabody Detective Robert Mahoney was the lead investigator in the case.Bransfield immediately filed an appeal of the trial following the sentence.