Khalilh Evans, 45, of Philadelphia has been sentenced to 3.5 to 10 years in prison for his interaction with a 14-year-old girl at the Willow Grove Park Mall in Abington Township on the evening of July 12, 2023, the Pottstown Mercury reported today.

A jury deliberated more than six hours in April before convicting Evans of a felony charge of false imprisonment of a minor.

“After targeting her, you lie in wait like a vicious animal waiting for his prey. There’s no legitimate reason for your conduct other than you had horrible intentions,” Montgomery County Judge Wendy G. Rothstein said during the sentencing, as quoted by the Mercury.

Evans was ordered to have no contact with minors and to stay away from the mall as conditions of the sentence.

He will also be placed under sex offender supervision, the Mercury said, and faces a 15-year requirement to report his address to state police in order to comply with Pennsylvania’s Sexual Offender Registration and Notification Act.

Evans did not testify during the trial but told a reporter the jury convicted “an innocent man.” The girl testified that she told Evans she was 13.

“The suspect was telling the victim that he wanted to put his phone number into her phone,” Abington detectives Jeffrey Anderson and Lieutenant Steve Fink wrote in the arrest affidavit.

Abington’s Police Chief Patrick Molloy noted during a July 2023 press conference that Evans had a “28-page rap sheet” coming into the investigation, including “numerous weapons offenses, possession of firearms, aggravated assault, terroristic threats.” Molloy described him “as an individual who should not have been on the street.”

A few days later, Chief Molloy responded to the Philadelphia Inquirer’s subsequent accusation that his comments “marked the latest examples of public officials in places outside of Philadelphia blaming the city for its approach to crime.”

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