Saturday, February 18, 2012 A former Minquadale Fire Company member was sentenced to three years in prison Friday after admitting he had illegal sexual contact with two boys who were junior members.

Robert Hart, 47, of the first block of Cresson Ave., initially was charged with multiple counts of rape, Deputy Attorney General Josette D. Manning said Friday night, but the state opted to let Hart plead guilty to the two lesser charges to spare his victims from the trauma of having to testify in Hart's presence about how he raped them.

The boys were junior members in Minquadale Fire Company, where Hart was a longtime member, she said, adding that was how he found his victims.

"We're very pleased with the sentence," the mother of one victim told The News Journal, adding Hart's crimes shocked the close-knit community, especially fire company members who knew and trusted him for many years.

The allegations came to light in April 2011, Manning said, when one victim disclosed what happened to him and told authorities Hart also raped a second boy he knew.Police located that boy, Manning added, and "he confirmed that he was raped by Hart."After his arrest, Hart was ordered not to have any contact with either victim or anyone under the age of 18, she said.

Authorities later learned Hart had violated that order by having contact with one of the victims and, when Cpl. Christian Hevelow of the Delaware State Police took him into custody for that offense, Manning said, "he was walking down the street with another teenage boy."

Hart performed sex acts on one of the victims, now 19, over a three-year period, Manning said. The second was a 16-year-old he offered to drive home, but took to a secluded area and raped repeatedly, she said.A "top-notch, thorough investigation" by New Castle County Police Detective Michael Bradshaw "made what might have been an unprosecutable case, prosecutable," Manning said.

Superior Court Judge M. Jane Brady sentenced Hart to one year in prison for each of the unlawful sexual-contact charges. He also pleaded guilty to violating the no-contact order and was sentenced to a third year for that.

"The judge recognized that the man is a predator," she said, and understood his pattern of finding victims through the fire company, which he had belonged to for many years.

Brady also noted that Hart expressed no remorse, she said, and sentenced him in a way that he will not be eligible for any reduction of his prison term for good behavior while incarcerated and, after his release, will have to maintain his registration as a sex offender.

full story at: http://www.delawareonline.com/article/20120218/NEWS01/202180329/Ex-firefight