Fairfield man is sentenced to life for child sex assault crimes

A Solano County Superior Court judge sentenced a 61-year-old Fairfield man and ex-felon to life in prison for 10 counts of sexual assault on a child.

Judge William J. Pendergast told Richard McCormick Sr. his fate during a court appearance in Department 11 in the Justice Center in Fairfield. McCormick was also found to have committed a prior felony strike for residential burglary.

In a news release, Solano County District Attorney Krishna Abrams said that over three decades, McCormick repeatedly sexually assaulted members of his own family, “betraying the trust and love of two generations of the most vulnerable victims.”

“The victims continued to live in fear for years” until they eventually came forward in July 2018, she added in the prepared statement.

All three victims, now ages 36, 11, and 10, testified to “horrific abuse” at trial in October 2020, she noted.

McCormick, who remains in Solano County Jail, for the time being, maintained that he was “the real victim” and tried to cast blame upon the victims; however, the claim was rejected by the jury, she said.

After listening to victim impact statements of family members, Pendergast imposed the maximum sentence allowed under California law and noted the defendant’s completelack of remorse and “the extraordinary damage he inflicted upon the victims,” noted Abrams.

The case was investigated by now-retired Fairfield Police Detective Steven Carnahan, and Deputy District Attorney Elaine Kuo led the prosecution.

After a two-week trial, a jury found McCormick guilty of the crimes, some of them dating back almost 30 years.

McCormick was represented by Stocktonbased attorney Scott A. Tibbedeaux, who, when contacted after the trial last year, did not return a Reporter request for comment.

Specifically, according to a post-trial press release Abrams issued, McCormick was found guilty of four counts of sexual penetration with a child under 10; two counts of oral copulation with a child under 10; three counts of lewd and lascivious acts upon a child; and one count of continuous sexual abuse, with the crimes occurring between 1990 and 2018.

McCormick was arrested on Aug. 30, 2018, by Fairfield police.

The Solano County DA’s Office filed its complaint on Sept. 4, 2018. His bail was set at $4.5 million during a September 2018 proceeding in Commissioner Robert Q. Warshawsky’s courtroom, at the time in the Hall of Justice in Fairfield.