Girl critical after being raped and beaten with hammer

AN 11-year-old girl, who was raped and beaten with a hammer after being snatched from her bedroom, was in critical condition yesterday following nine hours of surgery.

Doctors said every bone in the middle of her face had been broken.

Police in Salt Lake City, Utah, arrested Javier Sickler, a former high school classmate of the girl’s father, after finding him attacking the girl outside her home.

Sickler was booked on suspicion of burglary, rape and attempted murder. The suspect told officers he remembered banging on the door of the victim’s house and nothing else. “He’s claiming he had a blackout,” said Sgt John Salazar. Salazar said there was no connection between Sickler and 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart, who has been missing since she was abducted in June from a bedroom she shared with her nine-year-old sister in their Salt Lake City home. Police said Sickler, 28, and the girl’s father had renewed their friendship in the last few weeks. Sgt Salazar said the attacker slipped into the home through an unlocked side door and first went into the bedroom of the girl’s 10-year-old brother and asked the boy where his father slept. The boy pretended not to hear and went into his sister’s room to sleep after the man left.

The man returned a half hour later and took the girl from her room as her brother slept, Salazar said. The children’s father and grandparents also were sleeping in the home at the time. A few minutes later, a neighbour called police and reported hearing moaning outside. Salazar said two officers followed suspicious noises to the girl’s location, where they found the man attacking the girl’s head and face.

After officers jumped a wall and shined torch on him, the man ran several blocks toward his car until he was stopped by a police dog. Sickler’s record includes a conviction for attempted theft. He also had drug and resisting-arrest charges, said Salt Lake County sheriff’s spokeswoman Peggy Faulkner.