HEIDELBERG, Germany — A U.S. Army Europe noncommissioned officer was sentenced Friday to two years in prison for sodomy of a minor and child pornography possession.
Staff Sgt. Christopher Barberi, 38, was also given a bad-conduct discharge for the sexual abuse of a young girl from the time she was 11 until her 15th birthday. The seven-member court-martial panel found Barberi guilty July 2.
According to the girl’s testimony, Barberi had persuaded her to perform oral sex on him by showing her a video and telling her, "That’s what little girls do … ."
When she grew older and began to understand that his actions were wrong, she testified, he eventually stopped making her have oral sex with him. But he became physically abusive and controlling, she said, until she decided to report him in 2006.
The child pornography conviction arose from nude pictures of the girl stored on a computer disc at Barberi’s quarters that investigators had seized, along with pornographic stories involving sex with children.
Barberi never took the stand nor did he directly address the panel before sentencing. Instead, his lawyer, David Court, read a statement in which Barberi asked that his sentence not affect his family’s economic well-being, even though he was in the midst of a divorce. "I love the Army. I want to stay in the Army," Court read. "I don’t want my family to be a welfare family."
The statement also mentioned that he’d been a good soldier, during two enlistments, as evidenced by coins he’d received from, among others, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. It said he’d served for 18 years. It also said he had developed heat stroke during the first Gulf War and was "the kind of person who couldn’t go outside if it was over 80 degrees and the humidity was over 80 percent" yet had still declined a medical discharge.
The sentence seemed to be a blow to the prosecution.
Maj. Jacqueline Tubbs, a prosecutor in the case, noted in her sentencing argument that Barberi’s statement contained no apology for what he’d done. Court objected, and the judge told the jury that apologies were not required in such statements and that they should not be influenced by their absence.
Tubbs asked the jury to impose the maximum allowable punishment of 30 years’ confinement.
Court called that request "ridiculous," saying that Barberi’s crimes were not the most heinous of their type and that he was not a threat to society. Court said his client’s required registration as a sex offender would have a punitive effect in that whenever a child was molested, Barberi would be questioned by police.
Court also told the jury that deterrence, one of the stated goals of jurisprudence, isn’t an especially valid concept. "Others are only going to be deterred if they think they’re going to get caught," he said. "Nobody thinks he’s going to get caught."
Seal of the United States Department of the Army
Staff Sgt. Christopher Barberi, a U.S. Army Europe non-commissioned officer, was sentenced Friday for sodomy of a minor and possession of pornographic photos of the girl following conviction on 2 July. He was sentenced to two years in prison.

Barberi allegedly committed statutory rape of the young girl from the time she was 11 until she was 15, but could not be charged for his rape of the girl when she was 11 due to a statute of limitations. If the statute had not applied then Barberi would have faced a life sentence. Prior to the sentence, he was given a bad-conduct discharge from the United States Army.

The young girl said she tried to end the relationship several times, but was pressured to resume it until her 15th birthday. The girl said that Barberi told her "That's what little girls do."

The girl reported the sexual abuse in late 2006; at first to her mother; then later to law enforcement. She said it was because "It got too much for me to handle."

During this case the defense brought forward a 30-year-old woman as a witness, who testified that the young girl was lying. Prosecutor Maj. Jacqueline Tubbs cross examined the woman, and got her to admit she had lied a to CID investigator. That statement regarded the young girl's comments to the woman: "What she said was, 'You know he did this to you, too'", Tubbs said. The witness was also a relative of the alleged victim.