Waco man who sexually assaulted teens sentenced to prison on trafficking, child porn convictions

WACO, Texas (KWTX) - BREAKING: A jury on Thursday sentenced a Waco man who sexually abused two Arkansas teenagers while being secretly videotaped by his cousin to 50 years in prison on a count of continuous trafficking of a person and 15 years in prison for a count of promotion of child pornography.

Jurors in the 54th State District Court, who watched graphic videos of the abuse, convicted George Anthony Spratt Jr. late Wednesday night. Jurors, however, acquitted Spratt on three counts of promotion of child pornography.

Spratt rejected a 30 year plea offer before trial and was facing a maximum sentence of life in prison.

PREVIOUS UPDATE: Two teenagers who visited their adopted mother’s ex-husband and called him “Paw Paw” testified Tuesday that George Anthony Spratt and his cousin, Willie Ross Davis Jr., sexually abused them during summer and spring break visits to Davis’ home in Hewitt.

Spratt, 58, is on trial in Waco’s 54th State District Court on one count of continuous trafficking of persons and four counts of promotion of child pornography.

Prosecutors Tara Avants and Kristi DeCluitt rested their case Tuesday after calling the boys as witnesses and playing videos of Spratt and Davis sexually abusing the teens. Davis captured the video on hidden cameras, phones and computer cameras strategically placed in the bedroom and bathroom of his former home on South Haven Drive in Hewitt.

Judge Alan Bennett cleared spectators from the courtroom before prosecutors played about 30 minutes’ worth of clips from the graphic videos, which officials said constitute child pornography.

Avants told the 11 women and one man on the jury that it is very unique to have a case in which there is video evidence of a defendant committing sexual abuse. Court officials apologized to jurors several times for the graphic nature of the evidence they were forced to watch.

Davis, 62, Spratt’s co-defendant and cousin, was sentenced to 40 years in prison in May after he pleaded guilty to two counts of trafficking of persons and four counts of promotion of child pornography.

The brothers, who are now 22 and 19, grew up in Texarkana, Ark., and were raised by a woman who adopted them after she and Davis divorced. The boys called Davis “Paw Paw” and said he and Spratt first sexually abused them in a hotel in Texarkana in 2018.

The younger brother was angrier on the witness stand than his older sibling, glaring at Spratt throughout his testimony.

Avants told jurors in opening statements that Davis began “grooming” the boys when they were younger teens before he and Spratt sexually abused them on videos in May 2020 and June 2020.

The prosecutors introduced photos of cameras hidden in clocks and dresser drawers filled with candy and snacks and sex toys in Davis’ bedroom.

In prosecution testimony Tuesday, Maureen Fletcher, a forensic interviewer at the Children’s Advocacy Center in Texarkana, Ark., testified the boys made outcries of sexual abuse in July 2020, when the older boy was 19 and the younger one was 16.

Davis’ wife, Annette Davis, who now lives in Fort Worth, testified that she and Davis married in 2004, but said she was unaware of anything improper going on in her home until Hewitt police executed a search warrant and arrested her husband in July 2020.

She said she and Davis slept in separate rooms, adding that she was aware of the drawer filled with candy and snacks but did not know about the one filled with sex toys and other sexual paraphernalia.

“To say that I was shocked would not be the correct word,” she said of her husband’s arrest. “I was devastated and I was even more devastated when I found out who it was.”

Spratt’s attorneys, Lyle Grigg and Jeremey T. Katrycz, are set to present defense testimony Wednesday morning.

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