Adam Croote, a 23 year old man was sentenced to 25 years to life Friday in Albany, New York. He was charged with attempted second-degree murder, first-degree rape, first-degree criminal sexual act, criminal obstruction of breathing and forcible touching for his attack on the young girl. He plead guilty in March to predatory sexual assault of a 10 year old child that he was babysitting for.

Reports are that in 2011 he was babysitting the girl in her family’s home in Berne, New York. The little girl went to the kitchen for a snack and when she returned to her room, Adam Croote was standing there naked. He attacked and brutally raped her and then when she started screaming he started choking her to get her quiet and apparently tried to break her neck. He ran off thinking she was dead. Croote turned himself in after that telling the police, “I think I hurt a little girl.”

News reports say that the child’s family considered him a friend and they completely trusted him with their daughter. This part really bothers me because it is clear that Croote has a very tainted past.

In 1992, when he was only 2 years old his father, who was an Army soldier, killed Adam’s mother and left Adam there with his dead mother for several hours. His father is now serving a lifetime sentence for the murder of Adam’s mother.

Authorities gave his paternal grandparents temporary custody of the boy which obviously didn’t go over too well with his maternal grandmother, because while she had Adam on an unsupervised visit, she ran off with the boy.

It wasn’t until three years later that someone spotted Adam and recognized him from a flyer with his picture on it for missing children and they reported it to the police. His paternal grandparents were granted full custody after that.

The next year he was invited to the White House along with his family to witness the then President Bill Clinton signing an order requiring missing children posters to be hung in all federal buildings.

While still in his teens, Croote was shuffled back and forth to homes for troubled teens. When he was 17 he was convicted of forcible sexual contact after assaulting an instructor at one of the facilities. After that he was forced to register as a Level 2 sex offender which is what the state of New York assigns people considered at moderate risk of re-offending.

With all this background trouble I just can’t understand how anyone could have trusted this young man to babysit their child. I don’t know if it is just me, but I know I would have been afraid to leave him alone with my child. This little girl’s family claimed that they were aware that he was a registered sex offender, according to nydailynews.com, yet they still left their daughter in his care. He shouldn’t have been set free to begin with let alone been left alone with a child.

Thank God Adam Croote didn’t kill this child. She was only 10 years old with her whole life ahead of her. I just pray that this will not scar her for life and that she will be able to lead a normal life now. I will pray for her complete recovery.

Jan Barrett