Man Gets 37 Years to Life for Molesting 3 Youngsters

An assistant Little League coach was sentenced to 37 years to life in prison Thursday after pleading guilty to molesting three players.

Donald Brunk, 27, of Whittier pleaded guilty to 17 felony counts of molestation, kidnapping and attempted kidnapping before jury selection was set to begin in his trial.

He will be nearly 60 before he is eligible for parole under the sentence imposed by Orange County Superior Court Judge Richard L. Weatherspoon.

The defendant’s lawyer said his client admitted wrongdoing from the start and wanted to spare the victims--aged 10 through 12--the trauma of going through a trial.

Brunk’s parents cried outside the courtroom, expressing sympathy for the victims, but also pleading for understanding for their son, who they said has limited mental abilities and has asked for help.

“He’s not a monster,” Carol Brunk said of her son, who was adopted as an infant and once hoped to become a probation officer.

Family members of the victims were not in court for the plea and sentencing.

Brunk was arrested last January after police, acting on a tip from the mother of one victim, found him at Jerome Park in Santa Ana inside a locked Little League concession booth with another child victim.

The defendant, who had no previous criminal record and was working for an ambulance company, began coaching in the spring of 1995 for the Reds, a Southeast League team of 10- and 11-year-old boys in Santa Ana.

Police and prosecutors say he lured the three boys under the pretext of practicing baseball or taking physical exams, then molested them in a park or his home.

The molestation, which did not occur during Little League games, began in June 1995, with one boy being abused four different times.

Brunk faced a maximum of seven consecutive sentences of 25 years to life in prison, plus an additional 26 years, under strengthened state child molestation laws.

Carol Brunk said punishments against some convicted child molesters, like her son, are too harsh and she fears he won’t get the help he needs in prison.

“Just because there’s a law in effect doesn’t mean that law pertains to everybody,” she said. “We have to change our laws to protect the children but to also make sure that the person that’s being convicted can get all the help they can.”

Weatherspoon ordered that the sentences on many of the counts run concurrently because Brunk “admitted complicity in the initial interview [with police]” and “expressed genuine remorse and asked for help.”

The judge also noted Brunk admitted “every charge and allegation” to save the victims from having to testify in court.

Defense attorney Milton Grimes called the sentence “harsh,” saying he was saddened that a young man who could be “receptive to some treatment” will instead be locked away for such a long time.

“I know he committed a very serious crime, a crime that hurt this community,” Grimes said. “But for the record, Donald Brunk has led a productive life with the limited capability he’s been given.”

Grimes said his client was not a “sophisticated pedophile.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Steve Yonemura told the judge he does not believe Brunk understands how “badly he hurt these three boys.” He had urged a longer sentence.

The prosecutor said Brunk, if ever accepted for parole, could qualify under the state’s new “sexual predator” law for additional confinement in a state psychiatric hospital.