Man Found Guilty of Robbery Spree, Rape : Crime: Robert (Snake) Smith faces five life prison terms after jury convicts him of kidnapings and assaulting a police officer’s 15-year-old daughter.

A Panorama City man faces five life prison terms after his conviction Tuesday of staging a series of armed residential robberies that included the rape of a Burbank police officer’s daughter.

After three days of deliberations, a Van Nuys Superior Court jury found Robert (Snake) Smith guilty of 33 felony counts stemming from seven incidents in April, 1991.

Smith’s 10-day crime spree included 15 armed robberies, seven residential burglaries and five kidnapings done for the purpose of robbery, the six-man, six-woman jury found.

Each of the kidnaping charges is punishable by life in prison.

“We knew a cat has nine lives, now Snake has five,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Craig Richman.

“These victims have the rest of their lives to remember Snake,” Richman said. “Now he has the rest of his life to think about them.”

Jurors said Smith committed a series of heinous crimes, but the most horrible was the rape of a 15-year-old girl, who was attacked solely because her father is a police officer.

The teen-ager, testifying against Smith two weeks ago, described being dragged into her bedroom after Smith saw a mirror in her parents’ room with the words “Burbank Police Department.”

The officer was in court when the verdicts were read, and he gently nodded his head and rubbed his eyes as Smith was convicted of one count of forcible rape.

“No matter how much time he spends in prison, he’ll never know what we suffered . . . and will continue to suffer,” the man said outside the courtroom.

While the girl has remained stoic and appears to be healing well, the family underwent counseling, and the incident almost caused the officer to resign from the force, he said.

“He put a scar on us,” the officer said, his voice quivering with emotion. “He basically ruined my career.

“It heals,” he said, “but the scar never goes away.”

Smith was convicted of leading a small group of bandits who specialized in early-morning, home-invasion robberies. Police arrested Smith after he broke into his seventh target where no one was home.

Physical evidence linked Smith to five of the incidents, prosecutors argued to the jury, but his distinctive method of operation showed that he committed all seven crimes.

In addition to the five life terms, Smith could be given an additional 60 years when Judge Howard J. Schwab sentences him Nov. 15.

Two other men involved with Smith have pleaded guilty to residential burglary. James Crooms, 23, of Pacoima and Bevin Graham, 24, of Panorama City are scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 27. As part of a plea bargain, Crooms will receive a nine-year prison term, and Graham will be sentenced to seven years.