Child pornography sting nets 82 in 8 states
in US SE, 17 children rescued
Kids often found in homes of those arrested for child porn
"The youngest case we know of in Georgia was 3 months old."
Author: Phillip Kish, Hope Ford
Seventeen children were recovered as part of a multi-state sting that targeted people who distributed child pornography, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.
"Operation Southern Impact III" netted 82 arrests across 8 southeastern states, according to a GBI release.
Jimmy Abadio Lopez Johnathan Manning Matthew James McDurmond Keith Diver
In Georgia, there were 31 arrests. Most of those arrests involved the possession and/or distribution of child pornography. Seven of those arrested had traveled to meeting a minor to have sex, the GBI said.
Some included violent sexual abuse of infants and toddlers.
"It's not uncommon at all for us to find children in the homes of people who are collecting and viewing child pornography and it's not uncommon for them to be victims of that person," said GBI Special Agent in Charge Debbie Garner.
Adam Ware Keidron Isham Gerald Chamberlain Desmond Hasley
Sarah Koeppen, the executive director of the Hope Box, a non-profit that provides resources for parents and children under the age of 3 who are victims of crimes such as sex trafficking, explained what those victims can look like
"It can be the child of a relative, who is brought up to think that's normal," Koeppen said. "It can be a foster child, it can be someone who was brought in from out of state or out of the country."
Koeppen explains the images are sold online using animal code names,
"[For instance] 'I'd like a 3-month-old black lab,'" Koppen said. "The youngest case we know of in Georgia was 3 months old."
Of those arrested in Operation Southern Impact III, seven thought they were traveling to Georgia to have sex with children. They were really talking to undercover agents. Four were registered sex offenders, and 32 were already under supervision for committing other sex crimes
One had been arrested during a similar GBI sting in 2015, officials said.
Andrew Nelson Arlen Lemuel Riddle
Other states that took part in the operation included Alabama, Florida, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia.
Long Island high school JV baseball coach fired after
child sex abuse arrest
By John Asburyjohn.asbury@newsday.com
The Islip High School junior varsity baseball coach has been fired after his arrest on charges he sexually abused a 16-year-old student, police and school officials said Saturday.
Tyler Murphy, 25, was accused of inappropriately touching a student at the high school Thursday night, Suffolk County police said. The school resource officer reported the incident to Special Victims detectives, police said.
Detectives arrested and charged Murphy, of Ocean Avenue, Islip, with third-degree sexual abuse and endangering the welfare of a child, police said. Police did not disclose his relationship with the female student.
Murphy will be arraigned at First District Court in Central Islip within the next few days.
The Islip High School baseball team in November announced hiring Murphy as the JV coach on its Twitter page. He was on the school's 2008 and 2009 county championship teams, according to the tweet.
He had previously coached the junior varsity girls basketball team for two years, according to the district.
Islip School District officials said Saturday that Murphy has been fired as coach and did not work for the district outside of his coaching responsibilities.
All parents and players were notified of the arrest. Effective immediately James Lynch will become the junior varsity coach for the rest of the season, district officials said.
Iowa Barnstormers coach gets 180 years in jail for
child sexual abuse of >400 boys
IANS | Washington
An American youth basketball (or football??) coach who pleaded guilty to multiple accounts of sexual exploitation of minors and child pornography was sentenced to 180 years in prison by a U.S. district court. Greg Stephen, 43, had been accused by prosecutors of sexually exploiting at least 400 boys over several years.
According to a Washington Post report, Stephen ran the Iowa Barnstormers, an elite youth programme that helped many get college athletic scholarships, including at Division I schools such as Iowa, Northern Iowa and Wisconsin. Most of the boys were tricked by Stephen into sending him sexually explicit photos and videos of themselves while he posed as a girl who promised to reciprocate. He was also accused of touching some of his players.
Stephen also secretly filmed and photographed the boys as they undressed and slept in hotels or either of his two residences. One of the hidden recording devices was found by his former brother-in-law while doing some remodelling work for Stephen. He then proceeded to alert the police. The authorities later discovered a hard drive that belonged to the coach and contained images and videos and files bearing the names of over 400 boys.
Stephen's lawyers had asked for a 20-year jail term, stating that their client was no longer a threat to the community and that he had no personality disorders apart from voyeurism. Prosecutors countered by stating that Stephen had in fact admitted to touching the genitalia of 13 of his victims. One of the boys had told the police that he kept quiet for years thinking that Stephen was his link to college football.
The Iowa Barnstormers was founded by Stephen in 2005.
U.S. District Judge C.J. Williams said, "The harm the defendant caused to the children is incalculable and profound." Stephen said that his biggest regret was that his accomplishments as a coach were now tarnished, a comment that drew a rebuke from Williams, who said his biggest regret should be the damage he caused to the children and their parents.
Narcissism!
PA State Police seek Perry County man
charged with child sexual abuse
ABC27 News
State police in Newport and Pennsylvania Crime Stoppers are asking for help to locate a man charged with child sexual abuse.
Scott Kapp, 38, of Shermans Dale, is charged with 24 abuse-related counts, including four counts of statutory sexual assault, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a person less than 16 years old, and unlawful contact with a minor.
Kapp has ties to Mechanicsburg, Lancaster, Philadelphia and Baltimore.
Anyone with information on his whereabouts should call state police at 717-567-3110 or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-472-8477.
Callers could be eligible for a cash reward.
Ohio man charged with sex abuse of 4 y/o
LISBON — Thomas Harold Maylone Jr., 30, Smithfield Street, East Liverpool, was served a secret indictment for a gross sexual imposition charge.
Beginning in January 2009 and continuing through December 2012, Maylone is accused of having sexual contact with a child, who was only 4-years old when the alleged abuse began.
The indictment was issued by the grand jury in April.
Texas man charged with continuous
child sexual abuse of another 4 y/o
BURKBURNETT (KFDX/KJTL) - A Waurika man is charged with continuous sexual abuse of a child in connection with alleged abuse of an 8-year-old girl for several years at two different homes in Burkburnett.
Cody Allen Atwood, 26, was arrested in Waurika April 24 and booked into Wichita County Tuesday on a $50,000 bond.
A Burkburnett police detective began the investigation in March.
He and a forensic interviewer questioned the girl who they said at first said she was too scared to talk about what happened, and also that it was hard for her to explain.
When the girl did begin to talk, she told officials she would be blindfolded with her pajama pants and her hands tied behind her back before Atwood would begin what he called games, which police say were acts of sexual abuse.
She said it happened a lot of times and police estimated it occurred between ages 4- to 8-years-old.
Illegal alien charged with child sexual abuse in Illinois
BY HANA MUSLIC
A Caseyville man has been accused of sexually assaulting a minor on at least two occasions in the last year.
Jose Alfredo Mejia-Gutierrez, 43, was charged April 22 with two counts of predatory criminal sexual assault with a victim under 13 and two counts of aggravated criminal sexual abuse with a victim under 13, St. Clair County Court records indicate. According to the records, he allegedly inappropriately touched the child in December 2018 and April 2019.
On April 14, the Caseyville Police Department took a report of child sex abuse from the child and the child’s mother, Det. Danny Allison said Thursday. After the child was interviewed by the Child Advocacy Center in Belleville and police were able to determine a suspect, they brought the evidence to St. Clair County prosecutors, who charged Mejia-Gutierrez.
According to Allison, Mejia-Gutierrez was living in the country illegally from Honduras. Allison said that the department is working with Immigration and Customs Enforcement on the case.
Mejia-Gutierrez’s bail was set at $225,000 and he remained in police custody at the St. Clair County Jail on Thursday.
PA man gets at least 17 years for child sexual abuse of special-needs kid
HARRISBURG, Pa. (WHTM) - A Harrisburg man will serve up to 35 years in state prison for the sexual abuse of two children.
Jeffrey L. Beard, 28, was sentenced Thursday to a prison term of 17 to 35 years.
The Dauphin County District Attorney's office said Beard engaged in a sexual act with a mentally challenged 17-year-old he met at a local church. The victim disclosed the contact in 2016.
Investigators later discovered that Beard had also touched a 10-year-old child while at a local swimming pool. The child reported that, during the summer of 2015, Beard touched him over his clothing on his buttocks while teaching him to swim.
Beard has a prior conviction in 2012 for possessing child pornography.
Man faces 30-y/o allegations of child sex abuse in Utah
By Amy Macavinta
A 44-year-old man who allegedly admitted to having “wandering hands” is facing multiple felony counts of child sex abuse based on allegations that originated in his teen years.
Jared Martindale, who is currently living in Wellsville, was charged Monday with rape of a child and object rape of a child, each first-degree felonies, and two counts of sexual abuse of a child, a second-degree felony.
According to a probable cause statement filed in 1st District Court, two women contacted police recently, saying Martindale touched them inappropriately during the summer of 1989, when each of them was age 10 or younger. Martindale was reportedly 13-15 years old at the time.
Martindale has been held without bail in the Cache County Jail since April 24. During video arraignments on Monday, Judge Kevin Allen allowed Martindale’s release on these charges, although he may be returned to prison for parole violations on unrelated charges.
Three sexual abuse cases awaiting in New Mexico - another 4 y/o victim
Written by C.P. Thompson
Three men appeared in District Court on Monday in unrelated sex crime cases — two charged with criminal sexual penetration, while the other is accused of voyeurism and criminal sexual contact.
Christopher Simpson, 30, is charged with three counts of criminal sexual penetration on a child younger than 13 — all first-degree felonies.
According to a Silver City Magistrate Court affidavit for an arrest warrant, a New Mexico State Police officer was assigned to investigate allegations of possible sexual abuse of two young brothers. The victims and their family members said that Simpson orally contacted the victims, according to police interviews conducted from January to September 2018.
One victim said that he didn’t want to tell anyone because Simpson would get angry, according to an affidavit. When one victim didn’t want Simpson to touch him, he said, Simpson would spank them. A family member said that one victim had been abused since he was 4 years old.
The affidavit also says that Simpson had a history of orally touching other people.
In April 2017, officers with the Santa Clara Police Department also investigated allegations of criminal sexual contact of a minor and abuse of a child against Simpson, the affidavit says. In June 2017, then-Assistant District Attorney George Zsoka said charges couldn’t be filed because of a lack of evidence.
The victim “was unable to convey or communicate during the first safe house interview that anything happened between himself and Mr. Simpson,” the affidavit states. Another interview was recommended at a later date.
Simpson appeared at a detention hearing Monday in front of District Court Judge Thomas Stewart. Sara Schlack is prosecuting the case, and Daniel Dietzel is Simpson’s defense attorney. Neither attorney returned calls and emails from the Daily Press on Friday.
Simpson was charged with abandonment or abuse of a child in May 2012, according to the New Mexico Courts website. He was found guilty, and was jailed from May 2015 to November 2016, the affidavit says. Simpson was again charged with three counts of abuse of a child in January 2018 but those charges were dismissed without prejudice. He was also charged with larceny in 2018.
Case II
In a separate case Monday, David Valles, 20, appeared in front of District Court Judge Jarod Hofacket for a pretrial conference/plea hearing. Valles was charged with criminal sexual penetration in the third degree.
An affidavit filed in Silver City Magistrate Court said that a Silver City Police Department detective was assigned to investigate a possible criminal sexual penetration that happened on Nov. 11, 2018. The detective spoke with the victim and two witnesses, one of whom is the victim’s sister.
The victim told the detective she was at a party and hadn’t drunk alcohol for some time before then, the affidavit said. While she was intoxicated, she said, she was outside with Valles, who at that time was on the Western New Mexico University tennis team. The victim kissed Valles, who she said she knew and had seen at other parties. She told the detective he attempted to bring her into her apartment, but she didn’t want to and instead went back to the party. Realizing she was intoxicated and needed to go home, the victim asked her roommate to take her back to their apartment.
That witness, who is a friend and roommate, told the detective that she stayed with the victim, according to the affidavit. The two witnesses and a roommate each took turns watching the victim. One of the witnesses took another party-goer home, and asked the roommate to watch the victim. Ten minutes later, the witness came back and checked on the victim in the bathroom, where she discovered Valles having sexual intercourse with the victim. He didn’t stop when he saw the witness.
The witness then called for the other witness, who then also saw Valles having sex with the victim, the affidavit said. One of the witnesses pushed Valles off the victim and took him outside, and Valles was taken back to his dorm by a resident assistant.
The victim told the detective that she didn’t remember anything until the second witness came in.
Jess Lilley, Valles’ defense attorney, told the Daily Press on Friday that Valles “strongly maintains his innocence,” and believes there will be a trial “in the near future.” Lilley said Valles is still a student at WNMU, but has been temporarily suspended from the tennis team.
WNMU’s athletic website listed Valles as a freshman from Guadalajara, Mexico, on the 2017-18 tennis roster. The 2018-19 roster doesn’t include Valles.
Schlack is also prosecuting the Valles case and couldn’t be reached for a comment.
Case III
In the third case, Jordan Bringman appeared in front of Hofacket for a pretrial conference/plea hearing Monday. Bringman is charged with voyeurism on a victim under 18, a fourth-degree felony, and two counts of criminal sexual contact of a minor on a child under 13, both second-degree felonies.
According to an affidavit for an arrest warrant filed in Silver City Magistrate Court, a Silver City Police Department officer told a detective Aug. 5 about a possible criminal sexual contact of a minor, saying he had seen a picture of an 8-year-old girl that “was sexual in nature.”
The detective spoke with the victim’s mother, who said Bringman is the victim’s stepfather, the affidavit said. On Bringman’s phone, the mother found a photo of her daughter wearing a bathing suit while she was sitting in a chair. The photo was focused on the girl’s genital area, which appeared to be partially uncovered.
The affidavit said the mother also told the detective of two incidents where Bringman touched the girl. In a later safe house interview, the victim talked about the two incidents, telling the interviewer that Bringman had touched her private parts.
Chief Deputy District Attorney Matthew Bradburn said negotiations in the case are ongoing. Bringman’s defense attorney, Jeffrey Smith, declined to comment.
Grant Co., NM
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