Peter Buzzell will spend two years in prison and three under house arrest for his crimes.
By Samantha C. DePoy
Staff Writer

FARMINGTON – A Farmington man will spend the next two years in jail for molesting a young girl repeatedly for six years.

Peter Buzzell, 49, of Fairbanks Road pleaded guilty last September to five counts of unlawful sexual contact with a girl under the age of 14. After spending less than a month in jail, he was placed on house arrest in October due to a medical condition.

According to Assistant District Attorney Andrew Robinson, starting in 1990 when the victim was 4 years old, almost daily Buzzell would molest her sexually. It continued until she was 10.

Buzzell once was a Franklin County sheriff’s deputy and Farmington police officer. When the contact started he was not in law enforcement, he was collecting disability for brain lesions.

It was those lesions and the subsequent problems they caused that Buzzell’s attorney, David Sanders, cited as reasons his client should get no prison time, and instead be put back under house arrest.

Buzzell’s wife, Sheryl, explained to the court just how bad her husband’s health was, saying he spent around 18 hours in bed, the majority of those sleeping. He has seizures and recently has been having blackouts that last a few minutes.

Both she, and the 28-year-old daughter of Buzzell, Patricia Hagan, told the court the defendant was a wonderful man.

“He’s very loving. I respect him very much,” Hagan said, her voice breaking as tears rolled down her checks.

But Robinson’s sentencing arguments showed a different side of Buzzell. Robinson said the impact on the victim was so powerful, that she once tried to kill herself.

While the victim is now an honor student, planning to go to college next year, the effect the contact had on her was evident as she took the stand, telling the judge point-blank that she had been sexually molested by Buzzell for six years.

While she played with dolls and did other girl things during the day, she also feared for what would come that night, she told the judge.

Buzzell, dressed in a blue flannel shirt, black jeans and black sneakers, did not look at her. Instead, he gazed from behind his thick glasses out the window, tapping his left foot, his face flushed.

Robinson also said that her claims weren’t the first, and although Buzzell was never convicted, he did admit to molesting two girls when he was 17.

Sanders argued that Buzzell was showing remorse for his actions by pleading guilty and not dragging the case through a trial, which would be painful for the victim. He also argued his client’s medical problems wouldn’t be adequately taken care of in prison.

Robinson countered that the state prison in Windham has 200 inmates with chronic illnesses.

After hearing an hour and a half of arguments, Judge Joseph Jabar sentenced Buzzell to two years in prison, followed by three years of house arrest for counts one through four and then five years, all suspended, with six years of probation on the fifth count.

There were also some harsh words handed down from the bench to Buzzell.

Jabar said that while state prison might be painful for Buzzell, it would be no more painful than what the victim went through for years.

sdepoy@sunjournal.com

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