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Judge, Prosecutor Stunned By Depravity Of Child Molester

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By ELAINE SILVESTRINI | The Tampa Tribune

Published: August 14, 2008

Updated: 08/14/2008 04:58 pm

Related Links

• Read The Complaint
• Read Metz's Plea Agreement
• Read The Defense's Sentencing Memo

  Metz

TAMPA - Amber Williams suffered nightmares for years.

In them, she would try to run away from her father – through the house, up the stairs, under the bed.

"But my father would always find me and grab me and throw me on the bed," she said. "Then he would start touching me in places he shouldn't be. And he wouldn't stop."

The worst part, she said in a letter to a judge, was these weren't just dreams. This was her life.

Williams and her two sisters spoke today at the federal court sentencing of their father, Robert Metz, who was ordered to spend 40 years behind bars for trading in child pornography. All three now-adult daughters said Metz had raped them when they were children.

Investigators found 20,000 images of child and infant pornography on Metz's computer. One of the images depicted Metz performing a sex act on Amber when she was an infant. Others showed babies being sodomized and defecated or urinated on.

Metz is, a prosecutor said, the worst child predator she's seen in 22 years.

U.S. District Judge Susan Bucklew, who called Metz "despicable," said if she could impose a longer sentence, she would. She noted, though, that 40 years for the 54-year-old Bradenton man likely amounts to life.

Although The Tampa Tribune has a policy of not naming victims of sex crimes or disclosing their specific relationships to perpetrators so as not to identify them, all three of Metz's now-adult daughters consented to having their names published. They said they hope to help someone else by having their stories told.

By coming forward, the women are shedding light on a crime that often is shielded from the community because of media policies designed to protect victims. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1 of 7 victims of sexual assaults reported to law enforcement is younger than 6. Thirty-four percent of perpetrators of sexual assaults against children are family members.

The younger the victim, according to the statistics, the more likely the perpetrator is a family member.

Metz used the name of his youngest daughter, Rainbow, as his online persona when he traded child pornography with others and chatted about having sex with babies. "How sick is that?" Rainbow Metz asked.

She, like her sisters, described her life in horrific terms. They spoke of innocence demolished and souls crushed.

"Nobody knows the home I called hell," said Rainbow Metz, 18, struggling to speak through her tears. "Nobody knows that I have no safe place to run but to my own mind. The stress was more than I could handle."

She started cutting herself, she said. "My blood had to run so I could breathe."

She said she wants the worst for her father. "I want him to pray for death every day like me."

Her sister, April Johnson, 30, the oldest of the daughters, said, "No child should ever have to be subjected to the sickness I was subjected to." She described her father as "a sick pervert who gets off on preying on little kids."

Williams, 28, said Metz raped her during court-ordered visitation after her parents divorced. He coerced her silence by threatening to kill her and her mother if she told anyone.

Johnson said he should be locked away for the rest of his life. "If he is to be a free man again, he will resort to his old ways and no child who comes in contact with him will be safe."

The FBI arrested Robert Leslie Metz in 2007 as part of an investigation begun by Australian Federal Police, which forwarded information about Kissimmee resident Tony Guerra, according to an affidavit on file in U.S. District Court.

Investigators examining Guerra's computer found chat logs of conversations between Guerra and Metz in which they talked about having sex with infants and traded pornographic and sadomasochistic pictures of babies, the affidavit states.

As his house was being searched, Metz talked to a Manatee County Sheriff's Office detective and quoted from the movie "Happy Gilmore," saying downloading child pornography was a way for him to "go to a happy place," according to the affidavit.

Metz married his first wife when she was 16 and he was 22. After nine years of marriage, they divorced when he had an affair with a 14-year-old babysitter, whom he married when she came of age.

In court today, Metz said he was sexually molested as a child by an adult former neighbor. He said he lived in torment, keeping that secret until the FBI knocked on his door in 2007.

According to court testimony and documents, Metz told investigators he sexually molested or raped his three daughters. But a defense psychologist testified Metz denied that.

In court, Metz neither denied nor completely admitted his crimes. "My children don't lie, so if they're accusing me of molesting them and doing these things, then I guess I've done that. For two of my daughters I have no recollection that I can say I did it. I cannot deny it."

Metz' mother, sister, brother-in-law and nephew spoke in his defense, saying he has led a good life, volunteering in civic organizations.

"What he has done is in the past," said Metz's brother-in-law, Joseph Miller. "He can't change things. What he needs to do is move forward from this point in time."

Metz lamented that his three daughters and his son "hate me." He read a poem and said he dreams of "putting my family back together, to let my children know I love them."

"I have dreams also to talk to people like me," he said. He said research is needed on "the hows, the whys, to help the public understand. … We need to take a giant step forward to eradicate this problem. … We need to get the word out that there is places to help."

Murphy-Davis said her reaction, listening to Metz talk, was, "Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me?"

She described him as a sociopath with no concern for how his actions affect others.

Bucklew agreed with the prosecutor.

"There is a need to protect the community," the judge said. "There is a need for you to be punished."

Reporter Elaine Silvestrini can be reached at (813) 259-7837 or esilvestrini@tampatrib.com.

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