NY Woman Gets Prison for Branding Man

(New York City) A couple weeks ago, 23-year-old college student Kristina Caban was sentenced to five years in prison for branding a date with a piece of hot metal because he never called her after they had sex.

NY Supreme Court Justice Michael Obus called the crime "not remotely justifiable."

Assistant District Attorney Nicole Blumberg told Obus that Caban was the "mastermind behind the plan" to sear the torso of Samir "Sammy" Sara, then 23, for having sex with her once in 2004 and never calling her again.

Caban enlisted new boyfriend Robert Testagrossa to help brand a four-inch-high "R" on Samir's abdomen in October 2006, the prosecutor said. She said Caban lured the former lover to a hotel room, where Testagrossa and another man grabbed him.

Blumberg said the men used a Taser to immobilize Sara in a room at the Chelsea Inn while Caban laughed at his distress and kicked him while he was down.

The branding "iron" was actually a length of metal wire fashioned into a "R" -- heated, and applied to Samir's torso, said Tracy Golden of the Manhattan district attorney's office. She said prosecutors did not know what the "R" stood for.

Testagrossa, 27, was sentenced to five years in February. Both Caban and Testagrossa pleaded guilty in August 2007.

Maybe the "R" was for rage or revenge.

Tip: SuidaeEmpathy