Rapist-Kidnaper Is Sentenced to 101 Years in Prison

A judge Monday imposed a 101-year prison sentence on a Pine Valley man who kidnaped, raped, and robbed a woman motorist who was stranded near Alpine.

It was one of the longest sentences ever handed down in San Diego County for a crime involving a sexual attack. Randall Turpin, 42, received the sentence from San Diego Superior Court Judge Norbert Ehrenfreund, who also fined him $10,000.

Turpin was convicted April 23 by Ehrenfreund after a non-jury trial. The judge found him guilty of more than 15 charges in connection with the attack.

The victim, who was not in court Monday, was a 28-year-old Mexican woman, who had testified that Turpin told her he could help her on Nov. 15, 1989, when her car broke down in Alpine off Interstate 8.

During his trial, Turpin admitted raping and handcuffing the woman, but denied committing most of the other offenses.

Turpin was sentenced consecutively on almost each count, and the judge added a five-year term because of Turpin’s previous conviction for child molestation.

Ehrenfreund described Turpin as a “most serious type of sex offender” who had “overpowered this . . . 95-pound woman.”

“A woman is not to be used as a sex object, a tool, as an animal to gratify one’s sexual desire,” Ehrenfreund said .

“Though she was treated with animal-like conduct, he will be treated as a human being,” said the judge during the nearly three-hour sentencing.

The victim’s former roommate read a letter to the judge in which the woman said she is now almost paralyzed with fear when she leaves her residence.

“I don’t know how to forget the evil that he did to me. Inside, I am like a broken doll,” the victim wrote.

The woman wrote that she had forgiven Turpin for the attack because of her religion.

Speaking on behalf of Turpin were his two brothers, Roland and Steve Turpin, who told the court that their brother had often used drugs.

Steve Turpin, a minister at a Vista church, blamed the crimes on his brother’s use of pornography, but said Randall Turpin “is capable of being rehabilitated.”

“We feel my brother is worth something,” Steve Turpin said.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Genaro Ramirez told the judge, “The bottom line is that he’s evil. You don’t do what he did unless you’re evil.”

Both Ramirez and the judge said there was no evidence to suggest that Turpin was under the influence of drugs at the time of the crime.

“I believe he chose (the victim) because he thought she was a stupid Mexican,” said Ramirez. Turpin’s attorney, Albert Tamayo, disputed Ramirez’s theory that there was a racial motivation in the incident.

“I think the only reason he picked this particular individual is because her car had broken down,” Tamayo said.

The defendant told the judge he was aware of the emotional scars left on the woman and added, “I hope she can get past those.”

Towards the end of the hearing, the judge noted that Turpin had displayed “a high degree of cruelty, viciousness, and callousness.”

“I have no intention of granting leniency in this case. It’s not deserved,” Ehrenfreund said.

The prosecutor urged a 130-year term, while Tamayo suggested an unspecified lesser amount of time.

Turpin’s sentence is one of the longest terms imposed in the county, but another rapist convicted of sexually assaulting 17 San Diego women was sentenced to 174 years in prison in the mid-1980’s.