A U.S. Marine and Purple Heart recipient who lost both legs to a bomb in Afghanistan is headed to jail for up to 24 years on charges that he sexually assaulted a 13-year-old girl multiple times this spring.
Brandon Rumbaugh, 36, of Pleasant Hills had sex with the teen four times at his Plaza Drive home in April, spending the night there with her on at least three occasions, a criminal complaint said.
The girl called Rumbaugh a family friend, according to the complaint. She said Rumbaugh started communicating with her by phone when she was 11 or 12.
Rumbaugh negotiated a deal with prosecutors Monday and pleaded guilty to nine criminal counts, court records show. The charges included sex assault, statutory sex assault and indecent assault of a person under 16 years old.
Prosecutors withdrew 17 of the 21 counts against Rumbaugh of possessing child sexual abuse material, court records show.
They also withdrew two counts of indecent assault, and one count each of corruption of minors and providing alcohol to a minor.
Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Jill E. Rangos this week sentenced Rumbaugh, on various charges, to a total of 8 to 24 years in prison plus probation for 3 years.
He will also have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.
“I think it’s a fair result,” attorney Michael Deriso, who represents Rumbaugh, told TribLive Thursday. “I’m glad we were able to resolve it short of trial.”
The complaint said the former Marine bought the girl an alcoholic iced tea at a Sheetz convenience store before one of the sexual encounters.
She drank the iced tea and “didn’t feel like herself,” she told police. The pair later had sex, she told investigators. The girl said Rumbaugh told her “to keep this a secret until she was 18 years old,” according to the complaint.
Rumbaugh served in the Marines on active duty from November 2007 through September 2012, military records show.
He was deployed to Iraq for a six-month tour in 2009 and earned the rank of corporal a year later.
While serving in Afghanistan in 2010, Rumbaugh lost his legs while helping another member of his platoon, who had triggered a buried bomb.
When the Uniontown native moved in to help his colleague, he stepped on another bomb.
Surgeons later amputated Rumbaugh’s left leg below the knee and his right leg at the hip. He spent two years recuperating at Walter Reed Medical Center in Maryland.
A mortarman in the infantry, Rumbaugh received the Purple Heart and six other commendations, including the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal and the Good Conduct Medal, records show.
He ended his military career with a Wounded Warrior Battalion at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.
Rumbaugh later returned to Pennsylvania. He dabbled in land, oil and gas development, starting a firm he called Brandon Rumbaugh Solutions.
He also started working as a motivational speaker.
TribLive has written about Rumbaugh several times over the years.
He participated in 2011 in the 31st National Veterans Wheelchair Games. In 2014, he was gifted a 3,760-square-foot house in Uniontown outfitted with 155 adaptive features. The following year, he made headlines by spending time living on the street in Uniontown to raise awareness about homelessness.
A 2016 story covered the donation to Rumbaugh of an all-terrain wheelchair. And, in 2017, Seton Hill University honored him with a baseball jersey and a donation for a foundation.
“Be inspired by @BrandonRumbaugh,” former WTAE anchor Sally Wiggin posted to social media in 2015. “A remarkable Marine vet who has defeated the odds.”
