MONROE COUNTY, Tenn. — A Monroe County man who authorities say was secretly recorded raping his 14-year-old adoptive daughter in a case that captured national attention pleaded guilty Monday morning.
Randall Lee Pruitt, 44, pleaded guilty to three counts of rape, according to the Monroe County Circuit Court Clerk's Office. He faces sentencing Aug. 27.
The Clerk's Office said he entered "an open plea" Monday.
Near Christmas 2018, the girl began communicating with a Wisconsin man online in an effort to flee Pruitt, authorities and court records state. She told Bryan Rogers that Pruitt had been raping her in their Monroe County home.
She told Rogers she'd alerted her mother, Christina Pruitt, but that Christina Pruitt hadn't believed her, records state.
The family had only recently moved to Tennessee from Georgia.
Rogers told the girl to record an assault on a smartphone as evidence. The girl complied.
Rogers then drove to Monroe County, picked up the girl and they returned to his Madison, Wis., home. She hid in the house. They had sex.
Pruitt and his wife, Christina, reported her missing Jan. 14, setting off a state and national investigation.
On Jan. 31, 2019, FBI agents confronted Rogers at his home. He denied the girl was with him, but agents found her hiding in a closet, records show.
Authorities said the truth of what the girl had been suffering came more fully to light, and Pruitt was charged with rape.
Rogers later pleaded guilty to transporting the teen across state lines and having sex with her. He's serving a little more than 11 years in federal prison.
In July 2019, Christina Pruitt pleaded guilty to evidence tampering. She got a four-year term on supervised probation.
