A 48-year-old Gwinnett County man will serve 20 years in prison after having sex two years ago with a then-14-year-old girl in a Snellville hotel room.
Sergio Michaelangelo Paul was convicted of statutory rape and enticing a child for indecent purposes on Aug. 16 after a two-day trial. He was acquitted of two charges of aggravated child molestation.
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Paul approached the 14-year-old girl as she was taking out the trash in August 2015. He told the girl she was pretty and they exchanged phone numbers. Days later, on Aug. 18, 2015, the girl agreed to skip school to meet Paul at a La Quinta Inn in Snellville, where they had consensual sex, the Gwinnett County District Attorney’s Office said in a release.
The girl’s mother got a call informing her that her daughter had missed school that day. When the girl returned home, her mother questioned her for three hours before the girl admitted she had skipped school with “a boy close to her age.” The mother did not believe the girl and took her to speak with her pastor the next day.
The girl also told the pastor that she had been with a boy around her age. The mother then took the girl to the hospital to be examined on Aug. 20, 2015, and the girl told police she had been with Paul. That was corroborated by surveillance footage from the hotel and a hotel worker’s testimony.
Paul was sentenced to 30 years, with 20 to be served in prison. He will have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.
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