Former SCV man sentenced to 25 years in sodomy case

By Jim Holt
Signals CV
March 31, 2015

http://www.signalscv.com/section/36/article/134873/

A former Valencia man who worked part-time at a Santa Clarita Valley church last year has been sentenced to 25 years in prison for committing six counts of sodomy.

Brandon Wesley Milburn, 27, who worked briefly at the Real Life Church on Newhall Ranch Road in Valencia, appeared Monday in the Circuit Court of St. Louis County, where he was sentenced to 25 years.

In January, Milburn pleaded guilty to six felony counts of first-degree statutory sodomy, Detective Edward Magee of the St. Louis County Police Department said.

His plea was a “blind plea,” Magee said, meaning it was made without a set sentence in place, rather than a plea bargain struck with prosecutors.

Milburn came to California in 2010 and worked part-time at Real Life Church. Eight months ago, the church’s Facebook page informed members that the St. Louis suspect had worked at the church for 5 1/2 months.

He was arrested in March 2014 at the St. Louis Police Department after he arrived in Missouri to attend a function. He was not an employee of the Valencia church at that time.

Soon after his arrest, Milburn waived his right to have a preliminary hearing, bypassing the need for a grand jury, Magee said.

According to a copy of the criminal complaint filed against Milburn by St. Louis prosecutors and obtained by The Signal Wednesday, Milburn is alleged to have engaged two boys, each under 12 years old, in sexual contact that included touching the penis of each boy, having them touch his penis and performing oral sex on each of them.

Each of the incidents is alleged to have taken place on, or about, June 1, 2007, before Milburn arrived in California.