Metro

‘Sexual terrorist’ gets 30 years in Central Park rape

A courageous 73-year old birdwatcher lashed out at the creep who brutally raped her in Central Park, calling him a “sexual terrorist” in a dramatic courtroom confrontation Wednesday before a Manhattan judge sentenced the fiend to 30 years behind bars.

“You, David Albert Mitchell, for the pain you inflicted on me, and by association my loving family and friends, may you rot in hell for all eternity!” the woman, dressed all in black, declared in a loud, clear voice as she stared at the cowardly rapist.

“Make no mistake, this is a sexual terrorist, and there is only one thing to do with a terrorist, and he must be locked away in a horrible prison for the rest of his life,” she said as Mitchell, 43, his hands cuffed behind his back, sat at the defense table in an orange prison jump suit, staring straight ahead.

Earlier in the Manhattan Supreme Court proceeding, the plucky septuagenarian pointed right at Mitchell and gave a harrowing account of the violent assault on a mulch path near Strawberry Fields about 11:30 a.m. on Sept 12, 2012, as she was indulging in her beloved hobby.

“That’s the vicious predator who committed the crime, sitting at the defense table,” she said as about 10 relatives and friends sat in the courtroom in a show of support.

“He attacked me in Central Park when I was doing what I love best, watching and attempting to photograph hummingbirds. He pounced from behind and smashed me into the ground,” she said about the tattooed vagrant from West Virginia, who has an IQ below 70.

She fought back ferociously, she said as she delivered a chilling blow-by-blow of the rape, but was no match for the heartless thug.

“I screamed my head off and fought him face-to-face and tried to scratch him and poke his eyes out. He yanked my pants down and brutally raped me vaginally,” she said, shocking the courtroom.

“Then he flipped over like a pancake and raped me anally like a rabid dog. When he was finished he smashed me back into the ground and said: ‘Don’t move and count to 100,’ ” she recalled, though she notified cops immediately.

The horrific assault left her with a fractured bone in her eye socket, a broken finger, a broken tooth and damaged jaw. He also stole her camera.

“All because of what he did,” she said, demanding a long prison sentence.

“This court has the opportunity and the responsibility to do the right thing so that nobody else is ever hurt or menaced by this evil infestation.”

Mitchell pleaded guilty Oct. 1 to rape, robbery and possession of a weapon in exchange for 30 years behind bars.

Justice Bonnie Wittner said it was one of the longest sentences she had ever meted out in a plea bargain case.

“My sentence is in no way meant to convey there is anything mitigating in the defendant’s background,” Wittner said about Mitchell, who also admitted as part of the plea deal that he had pulled a knife on a man in Central Park on Aug. 20, three weeks before the attack on the birdwatcher.

“This lengthy prison sentence ensures that David Mitchell, a sexual predator, will spend decades in prison and off our streets,” said DA Cyrus Vance in a statement. “Attacks on vulnerable victims in public places terrify all New Yorkers, who have the right to feel safe in our city’s parks.”