LEXINGTON, MO – Lafayette County Prosecuting Attorney Kristen Hillbrener announces that Martin Constante, Jr, 38, of Lexington, Missouri was convicted on February 5, 2026, of two counts of statutory rape and one count of possession of child pornography, along with two other felonies. At trial, evidence was introduced that Constante committed these acts at a hotel located in Lexington as well as at a local orchard. Numerous witnesses testified over the course of the three-day trial, which was litigated by Prosecutor Kristen Hilbrenner.

Charges were filed in January of 2023, after the child disclosed during a forensic interview, conducted at Child Safe in Sedalia, that she had been raped on more than one occasion by the defendant. The mother of the child located photographs of the victim on the phone belonging to the defendant, and she turned the phone over to law enforcement. Officers then scheduled a forensic interview of the child, which led to the arrest of Constante.

Following the guilty verdict, at the sentencing hearing on March 16, 2026, the prosecutor asked for the maximum sentences on each of the counts, arguing that these types of heinous crimes deserve nothing less than the maximum. At the conclusion of the hearing, the Honorable Joshua P. Taylor sentenced the defendant to the maximum: thirty years on each of the statutory rape counts and to seven years on the possession of child pornography count, with all of those sentences to run consecutively.

The defendant was sentenced to four years on the remaining counts, with those sentences to run concurrently. The end result was a total of sixty-seven years in the Department of Corrections.