Copy of photo of Desarie Elizabeth Saravia, 5. (Michael Owen Baker/L.A. Daily News)

Calling it the worst case of torture he had seen in his 37-year law career, a San Fernando Superior Court judge sentenced Antonio Rodriguez to death Thursday for the sexual assault and murder of his girlfriend's 5-year-old daughter.

Judge Ronald Coen upheld a July 26 death penalty recommendation by a jury that took just 2 1/2 hours to come to the decision.

Rodriguez, who had grown hair during the trial to cover tattoos, shaved his head to hear Coen's decision, exposing "SF" and "69" tattoos. A defiant Rodriguez said he did not want to enter the courtroom with TV news cameras present, but the judge ordered him in.

As he heard Coen's decision, Rodriguez rested his elbow on the table, and placed his hand against his head, showing his middle finger to the judge and a TV camera.

The same jury convicted the 29-year-old Van Nuys man on July 8 of eight counts in the 2004 death of Desarie Saravia, the daughter of his then-girlfriend, Debby Saravia. The counts included first-degree murder, sexual penetration, torture, corporal injury to a child and the abuse of both Desarie and her brother, Brian.

The children were underfed, whipped, beaten and burned with cigarettes in the months that they had lived with Rodriguez. Desarie died Nov. 12, 2004, of multiple blunt force injuries to the intestines after she was beaten in a women's restroom in Hasley Canyon Park in Castaic. Brian has since been in foster care.

Coen has never overturned a death sentence in any of the 20 death penalty cases he has presided over.