Sex-abusing former Philly cop gets lots of jail time

Despite a parade of people testifying on his behalf yesterday, Tyrone Wiggins - a former cop and karate instructor convicted of sexually assaulting one of his martial-arts students - will spend a long, long time behind bars.

Common Pleas Judge Sandy L.V. Byrd sentenced Wiggins, 51, to 17 1/2 to 35 years in state prison.

The victim, who testified at Wiggins' trial last year, said he began sexually assaulting her for a period of eight years, starting when she was 12. She is now a 26-year-old Philadelphia police officer.

In court yesterday, she said "those eight years of molestation are a pain no one can understand" and the trauma "still haunts me to this day."

"You hid behind your badge," she told Wiggins. "You are a disgrace. . . . You're not even a man. You're a monster!"

Wiggins, dressed in a light-green suit, remained calm. After consulting with his attorneys, he declined his right to speak.

At his jury trial and in a presentence report, Wiggins denied ever having any sexual contact with the woman. He resigned from the police force the day before he was arrested in November 2009, which capped a two-year Internal Affairs investigation into the woman's allegations.

Defense attorney Scott Sigman tried to persuade the judge that Wiggins - who was a decorated police officer, a pillar in the karate community and a former Marine - had done many good works and should receive the mandatory-minimum sentence of five to 10 years required on his conviction for involuntary deviate sexual intercourse.

Eighteen people testified for Wiggins including church pastors, former karate students, his wife and other family members. Antonio Cabeceiro, who studied martial arts under Wiggins, said "a lot of people refer to [Wiggins] as a second father, a mentor, a coach, a lifeline. . . . Everyone loved him."

But Byrd, who also ordered Wiggins to pay a $10,000 fine and $5,000 restitution to the victim, and prosecutor Mark Cipolletti agreed with the victim in that Wiggins had used his position as a police officer and as her karate teacher to manipulate her.

Cipolletti said after the hearing that Wiggins began grooming the victim when she was 10, and when he began sexually assaulting her, it was "multiple, multiple acts" planned and coerced.

Most of her childhood, he said, was spent becoming "his sex slave."