‘Great victory’ for assailant
WAYNESBURG – The Carmichaels man convicted in 2012 of sexually assaulting a teenage girl, but later successfully challenged his mandatory 10½- to 21-year prison sentence in state appeals court, was resentenced last week to half that time and will be eligible for parole in August.
Leeland R. Barnhart, 39, was resentenced April 22 by Greene County Judge Lou Dayich to serve 5 to 10 years after appealing his earlier mandatory sentence to state Superior Court in 2014.
Barnhart has been jailed since Aug. 2, 2011, meaning he could be paroled in three months, although he has not been involved in any parole program through the state Department of Corrections, which could complicate a review of his release by the parole board.
Barnhart was convicted in May 2012 of concealing the location of a 15-year-old girl and engaging in an ongoing sexual relationship with her in 2011. He was found guilty of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and aggravated indecent assault, among numerous other charges.
Former Greene County Judge William Nalitz in October 2012 sentenced Barnhart to 10½ to 21 years in prison under mandatory guidelines for the involuntary deviate sexual intercourse conviction. Barnhart appealed the sentence to state Superior Court, which ruled in December 2014 that mandatory minimum sentences for sexual offenses against children were unconstitutional. That court ordered last March Barnhart must be resentenced.
Barnhart’s attorney, David Russo, called the successful appeal and resentencing a “great victory.”
“The sentencing should be up to the trial court that heard the case and not the state Legislature,” Russo said. “They should not legislate this, and that’s what I consider mandatory sentences do.”
Dayich was assigned to the case in January because Nalitz retired more than a year ago.
Dayich sentenced Barnhart to 5 to 10 years for the involuntary deviant sexual intercourse conviction and ordered the other sentences for the lesser charges be served concurrently. Dayich wrote in his order he took into account Barnhart’s lack of a previous criminal history, military record and testimony on his behalf during sentencing.
The judge ordered Barnhart to be held at SCI-Greene while Department of Corrections officials decide where to incarcerate him for the remainder of his term. He had been serving time at SCI-Somerset during the appeal process.
Dayich acknowledged there might be an issue with Barnhart’s parole eligibility because DOC did not enter him into the scheduled programs since his release date on the earlier sentence “was still some time in the distant future.” Dayich requested DOC make proper accommodations in light of the new sentence and potential release date.
“Because of the unusual procedural posture of this case, the Department of Corrections is encouraged to, at their discretion, make all programs necessary for the consideration of parole available to the Defendant at its earliest convenience,” Dayich wrote, “(T)he Court acknowledging that the lack of programming is no fault of the Defendant.”