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This Article is From Jun 03, 2011

Life term for couple that kidnapped, abused girl for 18 years

California: Phillip Craig Garrido has been sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison for kidnapping and raping a California girl and holding her captive for 18 years while fathering her two children.

A judge on Thursday imposed the maximum possible sentence of 431 years to life on 60-year-old Garrido, calling the defendant's treatment of victim Jaycee Dugard evil and reprehensible.

Dugard was 11-years-old when she was abducted by Phillip and Nancy Garrido as her stepfather watched her walk toward a school bus.

She gave birth to two daughters fathered by Garrido while he held her in a secret backyard compound.

Garrido, who was on parole for a 1976 rape when Dugard was abducted, pleaded guilty to kidnapping and 13 sexual assault charges, including six counts of rape and seven counts of committing lewd acts captured on video.

His plea was part of a deal with prosecutors that saw Nancy Garrido sentenced to 36 years to life after pleading guilty to kidnapping and rape.

The deal was designed, in part, to spare Dugard and her children from having to testify at a trial.

During the trial, the defendants made no eye contact with anyone in the room and kept their heads down as Dugard's mother, Terry Probyn, read her daughter's statement at the ongoing hearing that Dugard did not attend.

"I chose not to be here today because I refuse to waste another second of my life in your presence," Dugard wrote in a portion of the statement directed to Phillip Garrido.

"Everything you ever did to me was wrong and I hope one day you will see that."

"I hated every second of every day for 18 years," she said in her first public statement since resurfacing. "You stole my life and that of my family," the statement read.

In the statement, Dugard called Phillip Garrido a liar and said what Nancy Garrido did to her was evil. She said she hoped both of them would have as many sleepless nights as she had.

Officer Ally Jacobs, from Berkeley Police Department described Dugard's experience as "appalling".

She reminded media and spectators on Thursday that Dugard needed time to "heal, she should move on, and that's exactly what she's doing."

Another rape victim of Garrido's delivered him a message on Thursday; "I would like to let him know that I hope he rots in hell," said Katie Callaway Hall.

Dugard was grabbed by Nancy Garrido from the South Lake Tahoe Street where her family lived and forced into a car driven by Phillip Garrido on June 10, 1991.

The abduction occurred as Dugard's stepfather watched her walk to a school bus stop.

Authorities have said the couple drove the girl 168 miles (270 kilometers) south to their home in Antioch and held her prisoner there for the next 18 years, four months and 16 days.

At first, she was locked in the shed then confined to a series of tents she would come to share with the daughters fathered by Phillip Garrido and delivered by his wife.

The defendants were arrested in August 2009 after Phillip Garrido inexplicably brought his ragtag clan to a meeting with his parole officer, who had no idea the convicted rapist had been living with a young woman and two girls he described as his nieces.

The state last year paid Dugard a 20 million US dollars in settlement under which officials acknowledged repeated mistakes were made by parole agents responsible for monitoring Garrido.

California has since increased monitoring of sex offenders. Dugard has written a memoir set to be published next month.

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