Seattle man on trial in Internet molestation case

By Christine Clarridge
Seattle Times staff reporter

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It's as much a cautionary tale for single mothers looking online for dates as it is the tale of a Seattle man accused of using the Internet to prey on one mother's child.

Mark A. Black, 32, is on trial in King County Superior Court on charges of child molestation, attempted child molestation and taking indecent liberties after he wormed his way into the life of a woman and her teen daughter and molested the girl and two of her friends, prosecutors said.

"Innocently and naively, she got online and posted a picture of herself and her daughter, hoping to meet someone special," Deputy Prosecutor Julie Kays told a King County Superior Court jury during opening statements yesterday.

Black wooed the woman, and her 13-year-old daughter, with sweet words, flowers and gifts, Kays said.

Within a month, he had asked the woman to marry him and had moved into the house.

A short time later, Black was accused of molesting the woman's daughter and two of her friends during a sleepover.

It wasn't the first time Black had pulled such a stunt, Kays said.

She told jurors they would hear from a second woman who met Black years ago under remarkably similar circumstances.

The woman had posted a photo of herself and her daughter on an Internet site. The defendant responded and they began chatting online, the prosecutor said. Within weeks, they'd met and he'd asked the woman to marry him, which she did.

"During the course of that relationship, he sexually assaulted her 12-year-old daughter," Kays said.

In 1996, Black was convicted of second-degree child molestation in Snohomish County in March and of third-degree child rape in King County in December.

Black initially was charged with failure to register as a sex offender because of those earlier convictions.

Black's attorney, Wes Richards, told jurors the recent accusations came suspiciously on the heels of the girls being grounded by their mothers for horsing around with Black's truck.

In addition, Richards said, there were inconsistencies in the three girls' statements and two of them had initially denied any improper advances or touching by Black.

According to court documents, Black molested the three girls, each separately, during spring break last April, when all three were at the house for an extended sleepover.

The mother of the two friends, 12- and 13-year-old sisters, learned about the alleged abuse when she read a diary entry one of the girls had written.

The trial is expected to last about two weeks.

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