NORTHAMPTON — A judge sentenced former Ware tow-truck driver Arthur E. Salsbury Jr. to 9 to 13 ½ years in state prison on Thursday in Hampshire Superior Court, after Salsbury was found guilty of raping a woman in Granby in February 2018.
Shortly before his sentencing, the survivor described the incident in court as “the most terrifying, horrific moments of my life.”
“The terror from that night will never stop,” she said, reading from a statement. She said the incident has left her living in extreme fear and compromised her ability to work.
“I simply cannot bear the thought of this happening to another woman again,” she continued, adding that women who engage in street sex work are particularly vulnerable to violent sex crimes.
A jury found Salsbury, 42, guilty on one count of rape on May 30. He was acquitted on charges of kidnapping and aggravated rape.
Salsbury’s accuser previously testified that he had taken her to Dufresne Park in Granby and raped her after she had gotten into Salsbury’s car in the February 2018 incident, believing that he was someone she had been speaking with on the dating website Tinder. The woman said that she then fled from Salsbury after being raped and hid in a freezing swamp.
As a matter of policy, the Gazette does not typically identify victims of rape and sexual assault.
The woman previously said that she had been working as an escort at the time of the rape and had discussed an exchange of sex for money in the Tinder conversation.
“We are seen as disposable,” she said at Salsbury’s sentencing, speaking through tears. “I am not disposable.”
The woman said she is grateful that her case was taken seriously but added that she has not always been treated with compassion in the past.
“We can do better,” she said, calling for state rape shield laws to extend further protections to sex workers.
Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Suhl requested a sentence of 10 to 13 years in state prison, while Salsbury’s attorney, David G. Mintz, requested 3 to 5 years.
Suhl described Salsbury as a man with “a 20-year history of violence,” accumulating 24 crimes in 20 years, with instances of violence “escalated” over this time. Ten of these crimes were violent, Suhl said, including instances of domestic violence, violence against women and assault and battery on a police officer.
Suhl said that Salsbury had preyed on the victim as a sex worker and drug user at the time. She said she believes Salsbury thought that the victim would not report the crime or that her reports would not be taken seriously if she did.
Mintz, Salsbury’s attorney, said that Salsbury is “not a monster” and has a supportive family, which Mintz said would help Salsbury to successfully reintegrate into society as he appealed for what he described as a “human” sentence.
A commotion arose outside the courtroom as those in attendance left, with a few people shouting disparaging remarks at the rape survivor. The woman and those who shouted at her were separately escorted away by court personnel.
Judge John Agostini presided over the trial.
Jacquelyn Voghel can be reached at jvoghel@gazettenet.com.