Macon man convicted of statutory rape, child molestation sentenced to 49 years in prison
A Macon man who was 28 when he molested, statutorily raped and impregnated a 13-year-old girl he had met in passing on the street in 2018 and befriended was convicted of those crimes Thursday in Bibb County Superior Court.
A jury of five men and seven women deliberated for all of five minutes before returning guilty verdicts against Bryan Christopher Smalls on charges of statutory rape and aggravated child molestation.
Smalls, who was then sentenced to 49 years in prison, had earlier this week been offered a guilty-plea deal that would have cost him just 12 years behind bars.
In turning down the offer, Smalls, now 30, who did not testify, had seemed adamant about his innocence and later implied to the judge at sentencing that he had not known the girl was underage — a contention prosecutors shot down repeatedly.
At one point in her closing argument at the end of the three-day trial, assistant Bibb district attorney Dawn Baskin cited witnesses who had on more than one occasion told Smalls to “stay away” from the girl. Another person had once even asked Smalls, “What the hell are you doing with my 13-year-old niece?”
Smalls and the girl met sometime in late 2018. The girl later gave birth to Smalls’ child.
People close to the girl grew concerned about her welfare during months she spent time with Smalls. Prosecutors said Smalls had tried to pass the girl off as “my sister” or a “a friend.” But police went searching for the teen and found her at Smalls’ Ridgewood Avenue apartment in a closet, where Smalls had told her to hide upon seeing the cops outside.
After Smalls was arrested on rape and molestation charges, some of the phone calls he made to the girl from jail — which were recorded and played this week for jurors — included conversations in which he urged the girl to lie for him.
“When I go to court,” Smalls said in one call, “you need to tell them I didn’t do that.”
As he was being sentenced, Smalls said little and shook his head.
When his lawyer, Alan Wheeler, told Judge Howard Z. Simms that Smalls wished to address the court, the judge gave Smalls the floor. But Smalls passed on the opportunity.
“I have nothing to say,” Smalls said.
“Nothing at all?” Simms asked.
“No, sir.”
The judge then recalled the original plea offer that Smalls turned down, the 12-year prison term that Smalls had passed on.
“Mr. Smalls, I’m gonna tell you something,” Simms said. “I’ve been doing this a long time. For about 35 years I’ve been coming in and out of this building. ... I’ve watched a lot of trials, I’ve tried a lot of trials. ... In all of those hundreds and hundreds of cases, I have never seen anybody as stone-cold guilty as you.”
The judge went on.
“I mean, it just absolutely flabbergasts me that we’re here,” Simms said. “The allegation is that you, a 28-year-old man, had sex with a 13-year-old girl. Exhibit A: Your child. It doesn’t get any simpler than that. ... You knew precisely what you were doing.”
“No, I didn’t,” Smalls said.
“Yeah,” the judge said, “you did. ... You’ve got every right in the world to a jury trial, and I appreciate that just about more than anybody in the room. But I don’t understand what you were doing in here.”
This story was originally published November 11, 2021 at 5:51 PM.