NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) — A Brooklyn man who sexually assaulted a young girl over the course of two years was sentenced on Thursday to seven years in prison, the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office said.
John Stewart Russell, 62, of Park Slope, was sentenced to seven years in prison and ten years of post-release supervision on Thursday. He must also register as a sex offender upon release, prosecutors said.
Russell was convicted of second-degree course of sexual conduct against a child and endangering the welfare of a child on Jan. 11, after a bench trial.
According to the evidence, Russell became friends with the victim’s family during the summer of 2016 and began a pattern of grooming the girl. The defendant started giving the nine-year-old girl piano lessons in November 2016, and he abused her while they were alone.
The abuse continued until June 2018, when the victim was 11. The district attorney’s office said that Russell regularly groped the victim and subjected her to sexual acts, and that the abuse continued after the piano lessons ended.
Russell was arrested on July 30, 2020, after the victim told her parents about the sexual abuse.
“This defendant exploited his position of trust to prey on a young child, which is an unconscionable betrayal,” Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez said. “I hope today’s sentence brings some closure to the victim and her family and I remain steadfast in my commitment to protecting our children.”
Russell previously took a plea deal and was hit with a misdemeanor charge for sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl in 1999, and was not required to register as a sex offender, according to a report by the New York Daily News.
The defendant was also charged with groping a 15-year-old girl in 2018, but the charges were dropped. He was arrested again in July 2023 for allegedly abusing another underage girl between November 2016 and June 2018, the report found.