Newtown woman pleads guilty to sex assaults of boy

MILFORD — A Newtown woman convicted of sexually assaulting a 9year-old boy while babysitting him in Fairfield has pleaded guilty to other assaults in Oxford when the boy was 10 and she was 17.

The woman, Courtney DeMeglio, now 25, pleaded guilty to second-degree sexual assault and risk of injury to a minor Feb. 15 before Judge H. Gordon Hall at state Superior Court in Milford.

Supervisory Assistant State’s Attorney Howard Stein said law enforcement officials were made aware of the incidents in April 2022, after a therapist who was treating the boy called the Department of Children and Families to alert them of potential abuse.

A subsequent forensic interview with the child revealed incidents in Fairfield, Oxford, and Pennsylvania, where DeMeglio also faces charges.

Stein said the Oxford incidents occurred in summer 2015 at the home of a mutual relative. The boy told investigators DeMeglio sexually assaulted him during two separate incidents on the same day and was part of a pattern of repeated abuse for which DeMeglio will face between two and seven years behind bars in Connecticut before being sentenced in Pennsylvania.

Stein said the boy and his family were in agreement with the plea deal.

And while a letter from the boy, now in college, was read in court by a victim’s advocate, he said he doesn’t identify as one.

“I am not a victim, but I am a survivor,” he wrote. “Every single aspect of my life has been impacted from the horrors that have been done to me as a child.”

The effects of the abuse have been long-lasting, he said, detailing specifics and recalling how DeMeglio made him doubt himself.

“Courtney told me no one would believe me, that my parents would not love me anymore,” he said. “Courtney told me I was dumb and my selfconfidence is something I struggle with every day.”

Despite the adversity, he wrote that he and his family have tried to channel their experience into helping others affected by sexual abuse.

“I’m strong, I’m a fighter and I’m someone who wants to make the world a better place,” the letter said.

In their own letter to the judge, his parents wrote of their “immense guilt” for not having realized something was amiss, saying they look back at pictures of him from the period with hindsight.

“We now see the sadness in eyes,” they wrote. “As his parents, we are and were supposed to protect him. We failed. This is something we carry with us every day. There is not a day that goes by that we do not think of this, we do not question how we must have missed the signs.”

After her pleas, the judge asked DeMeglio if the facts as summarized by the prosecutor were “substantially correct.” “Yes,” she replied. DeMeglio is scheduled to be sentenced June 12 in Bridgeport in connection with the Fairfield and Oxford cases. She is expected to receive a prison term of between two and seven years in the Connecticut cases.