PHILADELPHIA – A former University of Pennsylvania (search) professor and noted researcher in brain injury was sentenced to house arrest Wednesday for drugging a woman and then having sex with her against her will.
Prosecutors had sought a prison term of at least five years for Tracy McIntosh, former head of the university's Head Injury Center (search). He pleaded no contest to sexual assault and drug charges late last year. Afterward, the university asked for his resignation.
McIntosh's attorney, Thomas Bergstrom (search), acknowledged McIntosh had acted immorally in the 2002 incident but asked that he be placed on probation and allowed to continue his research.
Judge Rayford Means sentenced McIntosh to 11 1/2 to 23 months and said he may serve his time under house arrest.
McIntosh, 52, a former Fulbright Fellow, was accused of giving the woman sodium pentobarbital and marijuana during a social encounter. The woman, a family friend, said she became ill and unable to resist McIntosh's sexual advances.
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