SAN DIEGO – Former NFL player Kellen Winslow II was sentenced to 14 years in prison on Wednesday for multiple rape and other sex crimes against five women in Southern California, including one homeless when he attacked her in 2018.
The 37-year-old son of San Diego Chargers Hall of Fame recipient Kellen Winslow appeared via video conference at the San Diego Superior Court hearing in Vista, a city north of San Diego. He declined to comment for his sentence, saying his lawyers had advised him not to speak.
“In the future, I plan to tell my story,” said the former Cleveland Browns star, once the highest-paid cage ends in the NFL.
Judge Blaine Bowman of the San Diego County Superior Court said Winslow can only be described in “two words and that’s a sexual predator.” The judge said he hunted down women who were particularly vulnerable, befriended a homeless woman, picked up a 54-year-old hitchhiker and assaulted a teenager after she passed out at a party.
Bowman called them “brutal” crimes. He noted that even after his first arrest, Winslow continued to hunt women. He performed a lewd act on behalf of a 77-year-old woman in a gym while hiding his ankle bracelet with a towel for GPS monitoring. He also exposed himself to a 57-year-old neighbor who was gardening at the time.
“The vulnerability of the victims was not an accident,” Bowman said. “It was the type of victim you were looking for yourself because you thought they might not file a report” or “wouldn’t be considered credible by the jurors.”
The 14-year sentence was the maximum allowed in a plea deal. He was convicted of violent rape, rape of an unconscious person, assault with intent to commit rape, indecent exposure, and lewd behavior in public.
The woman who was homeless and raped in his hometown of Encinitas, a beach community north of San Diego, was one of four women who made statements on Wednesday, including a victim who had the prosecution read hers. All described suffering from anxiety and emotional trauma years after their attacks.
The homeless woman was called to court via video conference from the San Diego County district attorney’s office, where she reviewed the proceedings with another victim.
She said that since her rape, she’s struggled to lift her head and walk, and she’s constantly scared, looking under beds and in closets, and can’t be alone.
“It affects my life every day and every night,” she said. “I never feel safe inside or out. You’ve done so much damage to my life. “
Winslow once played for the first round of the NFL, playing for the Cleveland Browns, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, New England Patriots and New York Jets. He made more than $ 40 million over his 10 seasons before leaving in 2013.
Winslow’s attorney Marc Carlos said he suffered head trauma from the many blows to his head while playing football, which may only explain why he “derailed” going from a star athlete to a convicted sexual predator. He said his client has accepted responsibility and plans to seek help.
Winslow was first convicted after a trial in June 2019 when jurors found him guilty of forced rape and two felonies: indecent exposure and a lewd act in public.
The same jurors disagreed on other allegations, including the alleged rape of the 54-year-old hitchhiker in 2018 and the 2003 rape of the unconscious 17-year-old high school student who went to a party with him when he was 19. .
Before being tried again on those charges, he pleaded guilty to raping the teen and the hitchhiker’s sexual battery. Those pleas saved him the possibility of a life in prison.
The father of two, whose wife filed for divorce after his conviction, had served up to 18 years in prison on all charges. But both sides agreed to reduce the sexual battery charge last month to commit sexual assault with intent to commit rape. That reduced the maximum sentence to 14 years.
Winslow must also register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.