Former BGSU professor, Timothy Davis, has been sentenced to up to 27 years in prison for three counts of rape.
Davis entered an Alford Guilty plea earlier this month in Lucas County Common Pleas Court to three counts of rape, all first degree felonies and was found guilty by Judge Gary Cook.
An Alford plea is one in which the defendant maintains innocence but concedes that the prosecution has enough evidence to likely get a conviction at trial.
On Tuesday (Feb. 22), Davis was sentenced to nine years on one count, and eight years on each of the other two counts.
Those sentences will be served consecutively.
According to court records, the judge found that the consecutive sentences were necessary “to protect the public from future crime or to punish the offender and are not disproportionate to the seriousness of the offender’s conduct and to the danger the offender poses to the public.” The court also found that: “the harm caused was great or unusual such that no single prison term is adequate, therefore the sentences are ordered to be served consecutively, for a mandatory term of 25 years in prison.”
Upon release, Davis will have to register as a Tier III sex offender, and serve five years for each charge of post release control.
Davis will get credit for the 168 days he has already served while awaiting trail and sentencing.
He was originally indicted in September for rape of someone under 10. Those three counts will not be prosecuted upon sentencing.
The offenses occurred last year between March 1 and Aug. 8.
A prominent water researcher, Davis resigned from the faculty of BGSU on Oct. 31.
