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Man Pleads Guilty in Molestation of 8-Year-Old
By Herbert Lowe
STAFF WRITER
February 4, 2004
A Queens sock vendor pleaded guilty yesterday to molesting and impregnating his girlfriend's 8-year-old daughter and faces 20 years in prison, prosecutors said.
Chancellor Drayton, 44, of 4-21 27th Ave. in Astoria, was charged with first-degree rape, police said, after the girl's grandmother found a "Dear Dad" love letter in which the child wrote that she enjoyed having sex with him and added, "I want to marry you."
The girl's mother, a Fort Greene resident, contacted police, and tests showed that her daughter was 15 weeks pregnant. At the mother's request, an abortion was performed and police arrested Drayton two weeks later.
Prosecutors contended that he had sex with the girl at least four times between Dec. 2001 and Oct. 30, 2002 - usually while the mother, a student at Baruch College, was running errands.
Drayton pleaded guilty in State Supreme Court in Kew Gardens to a charge of first-degree sexual conduct against a child. Justice Barry Kron is expected to sentence him to 20 years on Feb. 26, prosecutors said.
"The defendant is a dangerous predator who betrayed a child's trust and destroyed her innocence for his own gratification," Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said in a statement.
"The crime was monstrous and the 20-year prison term is more than warranted, yet somehow even the long period of imprisonment to be imposed somehow seems lacking," he added.
Two months before his arrest in this case, Drayton avoided a possible 25-year sentence when robbery charges against him were dismissed in Queens after a defense attorney, Mel Sachs of Manhattan, and a private investigator exposed discrepancies in the case.
Sachs, who also represented Drayton in the girl's case, could not be reached for comment.
By Herbert Lowe
STAFF WRITER
February 4, 2004
A Queens sock vendor pleaded guilty yesterday to molesting and impregnating his girlfriend's 8-year-old daughter and faces 20 years in prison, prosecutors said.
Chancellor Drayton, 44, of 4-21 27th Ave. in Astoria, was charged with first-degree rape, police said, after the girl's grandmother found a "Dear Dad" love letter in which the child wrote that she enjoyed having sex with him and added, "I want to marry you."
The girl's mother, a Fort Greene resident, contacted police, and tests showed that her daughter was 15 weeks pregnant. At the mother's request, an abortion was performed and police arrested Drayton two weeks later.
Prosecutors contended that he had sex with the girl at least four times between Dec. 2001 and Oct. 30, 2002 - usually while the mother, a student at Baruch College, was running errands.
Drayton pleaded guilty in State Supreme Court in Kew Gardens to a charge of first-degree sexual conduct against a child. Justice Barry Kron is expected to sentence him to 20 years on Feb. 26, prosecutors said.
"The defendant is a dangerous predator who betrayed a child's trust and destroyed her innocence for his own gratification," Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said in a statement.
"The crime was monstrous and the 20-year prison term is more than warranted, yet somehow even the long period of imprisonment to be imposed somehow seems lacking," he added.
Two months before his arrest in this case, Drayton avoided a possible 25-year sentence when robbery charges against him were dismissed in Queens after a defense attorney, Mel Sachs of Manhattan, and a private investigator exposed discrepancies in the case.
Sachs, who also represented Drayton in the girl's case, could not be reached for comment.
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