NORRISTOWN — A Montgomery County man showed no visible reaction as a judge sentenced him to at least 18 years in prison for sexually abusing a 14-year-old girl who was a runaway and who he supplied with methamphetamine.
Jason Matthew Hill, 49, who listed addresses along the 800 block of Vassar Drive in Hatfield Township, and along the 1400 block of Quakertown Avenue in Pennsburg, was sentenced in county court on Friday to 18 to 36 years in a state correctional institution on charges of statutory sexual assault, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse of a child, indecent assault, corruption of a minor and simple assault in connection with incidents that occurred in 2023 with a Marlborough Township girl.
“There is no question that this case provides devastating facts with regard to this young girl,” said county Senior Judge Thomas C. Branca, adding that Hill targeted the girl, who had a troubled home life. “This defendant took advantage of that, there’s no question about that.”
The judge also ordered Hill to complete six years of probation following parole, meaning Hill will be under court supervision for 42 years.
During a separate hearing, the judge determined Hill meets legal criteria to be classified as a sexually violent predator, agreeing with the results of an evaluation by a member of the Pennsylvania Sexual Offenders Assessment Board. That evaluator opined that Hill suffered from a mental abnormality, an antisocial personality disorder, and that he was likely to reoffend.
That classification means Hill faces a lifetime requirement to report his address to state police in order to comply with the state’s Sexual Offender Registration and Notification Act, previously known as Megan’s Law.
A jury convicted Hill of the charges during a trial in July, finding that Hill supplied methamphetamine to the girl, that he got her hooked on those drugs, and that over a period of time, he had sex with her on more than one occasion.
Before learning his fate, Hill, who testified during the trial and denied the sexual assault charges, addressed the judge.
“I’m still saying I’m innocent. I don’t want to be in prison for the rest of my life. I do know that it was wrong for me to have her around me, period,” Hill said while denying that he had sexual contact with the girl.
The judge’s sentence included a 10-year mandatory term available under state law for the charge of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse of a child and was sought by prosecutors Lauren Marvel and Margot Weitz.
“This defendant victimized a little girl who he made trust him, who he made rely on him, and he took advantage of her in horrific ways and in ways that really damaged her,” said Marvel, who sought a minimum sentence of about 26 years in prison for Hill.
“The defendant got this child addicted to methamphetamine when she was 14. He began grooming her. He facilitated a relationship with her where she and people around her trusted him. Then when he saw a vulnerability in her to get her away from her family, he took it,” said Marvel, adding Hill then sexually assaulted the girl. “This is an individual who is dangerous, who proved himself to be dangerous to this child, to the community, and manipulative.”
Prosecutors presented the judge with letters from the girl and one of her relatives in which they addressed the impact of Hill’s crimes. The letters were not read in open court, but Weitz said the impact was “indescribable.”
“The defendant’s actions toward the victim had a large impact on her. The effect that not only his sexual abuse but the emotional and psychological manipulation had on her is extreme,” said Weitz, who praised the girl’s courage to testify at trial.
“The defendant took advantage of her age, of her youth, of her naivety, of her lack of support around her, and he made her have a hard time trusting and have a hard time feeling safe,” said Weitz, adding that despite Hill’s abuse, the girl is now leading a successful life and regaining her sense of identity and trust.
Defense lawyer John H. Pavloff argued for a sentence of 12 to 24 years in prison for Hill.
During the four-day trial, Marvel and Weitz characterized the victim as “a broken little girl” whose mother died of a drug overdose, who had no adult supervision, who felt “unloved and ignored,” and who became addicted to methamphetamine at a young age.
Hill, prosecutors alleged, targeted the vulnerable child, established a relationship with her, and groomed her for sexual abuse. At the time of the abuse, the girl was 14 and Hill was 48.
Prosecutors argued Hill took the girl to at least two residences known as “trap houses” in Montgomery and Bucks counties, where drug addicted people stayed or hung out, forcing the girl to hide in a closet at one location where she had to urinate and defecate in a bag and had little to eat.
Hill sexually assaulted the girl at two of the locations to which he took the girl, according to prosecutors.
During the course of her interaction with Hill, the girl lost weight, going from 130 to about 90 pounds, according to testimony. Authorities said methamphetamine is a powerful, highly addictive stimulant that can cause severe physical ailments and overdose deaths.
“In addition to providing illegal drugs to the juvenile, Hill began to engage in grooming behavior. Hill gained the trust of the juvenile in what was described by the juvenile as ‘trauma bonding.’ It was explained that Hill would tell the juvenile stories related to his childhood, many of the same issues that the juvenile experienced in her lifetime,” county Detective Walter Kerr and Marlborough Township Police Officer Andrew Curtis wrote in the arrest affidavit.
The investigation began in June 2023, when members of the Pennridge Regional Police Department responded to a Bucks County residence for a report that a teenage girl was there and using methamphetamine. Arriving officers encountered the victim at the third house to which Hill had taken the girl, but Hill was not at the residence.
The girl was taken to a local hospital for evaluation and subsequently turned over to the custody of a relative. The girl eventually was taken to a drug treatment facility and revealed the sexual assaults to a therapist more than a year later while in counseling, testimony revealed.
During her testimony to the jury, the girl, now 17 and drug-free after two stints in rehabilitation facilities, wept at times as she recalled the abuse.
Marvel and Weitz praised the investigation conducted by Kerr and Curtis.
“The police work in this case was phenomenal. If not for the Marlborough Township Police Department and the Montgomery County Detective Bureau, we would not have been able to discover everything that the defendant did to this victim,” Weitz said.
During the trial, Pavloff argued prosecutors did not have sufficient evidence to support the charges, including no DNA evidence linking Hill to having sexual contact with the girl. Pavloff maintained there was reasonable doubt in the case and that Hill was “a lady’s man” who loved adult women and was not attracted to children.
When he testified during the trial, Hill adamantly denied the girl’s allegations, claiming he thought of the girl as his “little sister.” While admitting he was in the wrong for taking the girl to “bad places,” flop houses in Montgomery and Bucks counties, where they used methamphetamine, Hill denied sexually abusing her while she was high on drugs.
