Strategies Outlined in Carney Trial

On this much both sides agree: Kevin Wright Carney seemed to easily befriend children.

The former Palmdale city councilman and Los Angeles County sheriff’s sergeant often had kids come to his house because of his turtle collection. For years, Carney was a “surrogate father” to a girl raised by her single-parent mother, according to both prosecution and defense.

Then the stories diverge.

During Tuesday’s opening statements of Carney’s molestation trial, a prosecutor called the 49-year-old man a longtime molester who repeatedly took sexual advantage of children close to him. “This trial is about betrayal. . . of four little girls, four little girls who placed their trust in the defendant,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Robert Dver.

But Carney’s defense attorney, Milton Grimes, argued that his client was only a do-gooder who got into trouble because of lies and, possibly, dirty politics. Grimes pointed out that the investigation, which led to charges being filed, began as Carney was running for election to the Palmdale City Council last year.

“Mr. Carney is saying none of [the alleged molestations] happened,” Grimes said.

Carney, who is also a former school board president, is charged with 16 counts of molestation-related offenses, ranging from unlawful sexual intercourse to lewd acts to unlawful oral copulation. He faces a maximum punishment of multiple life sentences if convicted on all counts. He is free on $500,000 bail.

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On Tuesday, attorneys gave an overview of what the jury of five women and seven men should expect to hear during the trial before Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge James C. Chalfant.

Key testimony will come from one of the girls, “the most tragic” victim of the case, for whom Carney had acted as a father figure, Dver said. Over an eight-year period, Carney showered her with gifts, took her on a camping trip to Yosemite and molested her countless times, Dver said.

Carney was arrested after that girl, then 14, started bleeding after the most severe incident in which she lost her virginity, got scared and told a friend, her mother and then authorities, Dver said. Medical personnel who treated the girl after the Oct. 28, 1999 incident will testify that her injuries indicated sexual assault, and fibers from Carney’s truck were found in the girl’s underwear, Dver added.

In a telephone conversation secretly recorded by police just before his arrest, the girl told Carney that she was bleeding, hurting, didn’t know what to do and asked him to come over to her home, according to a tape played for jurors.

Carney told her to put on a pad and at one point asked, “Is somebody else recording this?”

When he showed up at her home, he was arrested by a lieutenant and a sergeant from the Sheriff’s Department.

Of the other three victims, one felt Carney’s hand on her thigh and her shirt being pulled up during a camping trip after she climbed into his sleeping bag, Dver said. The other two were allegedly molested when they visited Carney at his home to see his pet turtles--a popular attraction for many of the neighborhood children.

But Grimes, Carney’s defense attorney, said the girls aren’t credible.

He said the mother of one of the girls told police not to believe her daughter and would be testifying for the defense.

The mother of another girl, for whom Carney had acted as a surrogate father, was a social worker who often told her daughter about sexually abused children, let the girl read her molestation cases and repeatedly asked her whether Carney ever molested her, to which the girl always replied “no,” Grimes said.

A third victim “is a little girl with a lot of imagination,” Grimes said. As for the fourth victim, Grimes said another adult at the camping trip will testify that nothing untoward happened.

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There is no DNA evidence indicating that Carney sexually assaulted anyone, Grimes said. Carney, who will testify in his own defense, became suspicious during the taped telephone conversation “because he’s a police officer and he’s not a fool. He heard a click-click-click of a tape recorder. That’s why he said, ‘Is someone taping this?’ ”

Carney, who was arrested just days before he was elected to the Palmdale City Council, resigned from office to focus on his defense. Carney was previously investigated on suspicion of molestation when he ran unsuccessfully for mayor in 1997, but charges were not filed against him.

Carney is married with three children, a “Renaissance man” who’s an artist, an actor and a musician who plays in a band, Grimes said.

Formerly in charge of the sheriff’s child abuse unit for Lancaster and Palmdale, Carney “has a special place in his heart for young people,” Grimes added.