Child-Sex Case Draws Life Sentence

By Kim Smith
Originally published in The Las Vegas Sun, May 8, 2002

A 45-year-old Las Vegas man was sentenced to 40 years to life in prison Tuesday for sexually abusing three young girls in a case police discovered by mistake.

Deputy District Attorney Clark Peterson said Metro Police officers who responded to a call about a possible methamphetamine lab received permission to open a safe found inside the house.

In addition to finding drug paraphernalia, police found videotapes showing George William Gibbs engaging in sex acts with two 6-year-old girls, who later told the police about a third 6-year-old who had also been sexually abused.

Gibbs was convicted in November on 27 sex-related charges and three drug-related charges.

At least one of the girls was abused over a period of years and was introduced to crack cocaine by Gibbs, Peterson said. The girl, now 13, has had five other adult sex partners and is recovering from addictions to crack cocaine, powder cocaine, meth, marijuana, LSD and Ecstasy.

On Tuesday Peterson asked District Judge Jeffrey Sobel to run all 30 sentences consecutively, saying Gibbs could never be trusted on parole.

Gibbs told Sobel he was sorry for causing pain to the families of the victims, but then said the incidents caught on tape were an aberration. He also said he had nothing to do with the drugs found in the home.

The case against him has just gotten "way out of control," Gibbs complained.

"I'm not some deviant pedophile running about the streets," Gibbs said. "I never sexually assaulted a child in my life, but I'm carrying the weight of that around and I'm carrying the weight of a meth lab and everything else, too."

Sobel followed the recommendation of the Division of Parole and Probation and sentenced Gibbs to consecutive terms of 20 to life, 10 to life and 10 years. He ran all of the other sentences concurrently.