Man caught texting about child sex abuse to girlfriend on plane flight jailed
An eagle-eyed fellow airline passenger spotted the vile exchange over text message and alerted authorities with the help of the flight crew
A man who was caught out sending vile text messages about molesting children while on a flight to California has been been jailed for 15 years.
An eagle-eyed fellow airline passenger spotted the vile exchange and alerted authorities with the help of the flight crew.
Michael Kellar, 58, was convicted of conspiracy to produce child pornography, reports a press release from the US Attorney's Office in Washington's Western District.
His girlfriend, Lynn Burnworth, 52, pleaded guilty to distribution of child pornography and will be sentenced on the March 27.
The passenger witnessed the text exchange between them on July 31, they were then arrested in August 2017.
At the time of the flight Burnworth was in Tacoma, Washington.
An investigation found that the two had produced and shared sexually explicit images of children that were in the woman's care.
During Kellar's sentencing US District Judge Ronald B said: "This case for me has been the most disturbing case that I have had. (These offenses) beset on society a waterfall of negative repercussions that can never be repaired."
The airline passenger who reported Kellar was praised by the US Attorney Brian T Moran for coming forward about the disturbing texts she witnessed on her flight.
They said: "We all have had that moment when we question: 'Do I get involved'. In this case, that witness triggered the rescue of two small children and the investigation that revealed this defendant to be a predator – collecting images of child sexual abuse."
The passenger informed airline flight attendants who then had law enforcement meet the plane and Kellar was arrested.
Graphic explicit images were discovered in an exchange with Burnworth.
A court-authorised warrant was obtained to search Burnworth's residence, where sexually explicit images on her phone and several hundred images of child sex abuse on Kellar's laptop were found.
"Sexual exploitation of children is particularly heinous, and the FBI has made it a priority to hold those who choose to perpetrate these acts accountable," said Special Agent in Charge Raymond Duda, FBI-Seattle.
"Mr Kellar will now answer for his crimes against some of the most vulnerable in our community. This case demonstrates the FBI will rigorously investigate these crimes and reinforces that victimising children will not be tolerated by law enforcement."
Kellar pleaded guilty to the charge and access with intent to view child pornography on September 25, 2019.
Lincoln, Neb, man gets combined sentences of
39-50 years for child sex assaults
Lori Pilger
Lincoln Journal Star
A Lincoln man sentenced to 20 to 30 years in prison in Seward earlier this week for sexually assaulting a young girl there in 2018 got 19 to 20 years more in Lincoln on Friday for sexually abusing a second girl that same year.
It happened while Alex P. Garden was on supervised release on a federal child pornography charge.
Garden, who pleaded no contest to second-degree sexual assault in the Lincoln case and no contest to first-degree sexual assault in Seward County, didn't say anything before Lancaster County District Judge Lori Maret sentenced him.
Deputy Lancaster County Attorney Charles Byrd disputed the defense contention that Garden had taken responsibility for his actions. He pleaded no contest, rather than guilty, and in a typed statement said only that he had done some inappropriate things.
Byrd said Garden wasn't clear whether that included showering with a 10-year-old girl or nakedly touching himself in her presence, as the girl alleged.
"He is a very dangerous risk to this community's safety," Byrd said, arguing for the maximum sentence of 20 years.
On the other side, defense attorney Mark Rappl argued that a sentence of 10 years would be more appropriate, given Garden's mental health history and traumatic childhood, which included sexual abuse as a grade-school student.
Maret said she didn't view that as a mitigating factor and could think of no way — short of life in prison — "that would truly protect society from you. Mr. Garden, you have forever changed the trajectory of several people," she said, before sentencing him to 19 to 20 years.
The allegations came to light June 1, 2018, when the 10-year-old girl told her mother what Garden had done. She later told a forensic interviewer that he asked her to shower with him, then touched himself and performed a sex act on her, according to an affidavit for his arrest.
Later that month, a 6-year-old girl in Seward County told her mother about what Garden had done to her in June 2018.
At the time, Garden, a registered sex offender, was on supervised release on a 2016 federal case where he pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography. He had served his sentence, was put on house arrest in late 2017 and then on supervised release in March 2018.
A probation officer discovered a child-sized, rubber sex doll in a search of Garden's home and found that he had disabled the monitoring service for his cellphone for nearly a month.
Vernon, VT, man charged for having
images of child sexual abuse
By Mike Donoghue, Brattleboro Reformer
MONTPELIER — Attorney General T.J. Donovan announced that a southern Vermont man was arraigned Friday on five felony counts of possession of child sexual abuse images.
Antonia Tyson, 53, of Vernon pleaded not guilty in Vermont Superior Court in Barre, Donovan said. The court released him on conditions, which include limitations on his access to children.
Donovan said in a news release that Tyson was arrested after law enforcement executed a search warrant at his residence and discovered images of what appeared to be child sexual abuse on one of his electronic devices.
Donovan's office said it was unable to provide any details about the five felonies that were charged.
It also was unclear why Tyson was brought to Barre for arraignment instead of being processed locally at the courthouse in neighboring Brattleboro.
Cedar County, IA, sheriff, deputies demand county attorney steps down for mishandling of sexual abuse cases
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Cedar County Attorney Jeff Renander mishandled several criminal cases causing victims to be re-victimized, deputies say.
Credit: KCRG
Author: Hannah Rodriguez
CEDAR COUNTY, Iowa — The sheriff of Cedar County, Iowa and all 13 deputies are calling for the county's attorney to step down after they say he mishandled several criminal cases, including sexual abuse cases, some with children involved.
The sheriff's office signed a petition describing Cedar County Attorney Jeff Renander's alleged mishandling of cases where he "made egregiously inappropriate comments to the victim of a sexual abuse case he recently handled."
The petition says Renander victim-shamed people in his cases and minimized the "traumatic experiences of multiple sexual abuse victims, to include child sexual abuse victims."
A Cedar County detective who signed the petition said the deputies have considered calling for Renander's resignation for several months.
The detective indicated there was a specific case from mid-February that compelled him and the deputies to take a stand. In the case, Renander accepted a plea deal for a victim involving a defendant who was facing up to 10 years in jail for felony third-degree sexual abuse.
Court records show the defendant was sentenced to 90 days in jail and will not have to register as a sex offender.
"We have a county attorney who's not doing his [job]," said the detective. "He's afraid of going to trial so he just pleads everything down."
No legal actions have been filed against the attorney.
Good grief. He's not the only county/district attorney who accepts very soft deals; I have been complaining about this coast-to-coast for years. When a defense lawyer knows the AG doesn't want to go to trial he can easily push him to make absurd deals like this. It doesn't protect society, and it revictimizes victims. The man should be fired.
Saugus, CA, man to be arraigned on child sex charges
JIM HOLT
The Signal
The Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff's Station
A Saugus man accused of continuous sexual abuse on a child and of committing lewd acts on a child is scheduled to be arraigned in court Friday.
Marino Daniele Giammarco, 29, who according to arresting deputies worked as a cook, is expected to appear in San Fernando Superior Court to be formally charged with two felony counts.
Deputies with the Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station arrested Giammarco on the afternoon of April 13, 2019, on suspicion of carrying a concealed weapon.
After the case was presented to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, prosecutors decided to proceed with the sex charge allegations and not the weapons offense.
“He was charged with a misdemeanor count of having a concealed firearm on his person but that count was dismissed,” D.A. spokesman Ricardo Santiago said Thursday.
“Arraignment on the felony information is scheduled (for Friday),” he added.
Prosecutors claim that between Aug. 1, 2016 and April 8, 2019, Giammarco committed continuous sexual abuse on a child under the age of 14 and that he engaged in more than three “lewd and lascivious acts” on that child.
Prosecutors noted in the information filed, that the charge is a serious felony and a violent felony, citing specific sections of the the state’s penal code.
They also allege that on or about April 9, 2019, Giammarco committed a lewd act on the same child.
About 16 hours after his arrest on April 13, 2019, he posted bail which was set at $460,000, and was released from custody.
It must pay well to be a cook!
Arizona police use DNA to connect Sierra Vista man
to child sex crimes
By: Phil Villarreal, 9KGUN
TUCSON, Ariz. - Sierra Vista police arrested a man on child sex charges after connecting him to the crimes with DNA test results.
Police say 42-year-old David Britton Bowser took an underage girl to a gas station on Highway 92 in August 2019. The girl left the car and asked a clerk to help her get away from him.
Bowser was inside his vehicle and impaired, with a blood alcohol content of 0.245 -- three times the legal limit.
The girl said Bowser committed sex crimes against her, and police investigated.
They say Bowser lived with the girl's grandmother and the girl was staying there when the crime happened.
Police collected physical evidence from the apartment, as well as DNA evidence from the girl and Bowser. The DNA results connected Bowser to the crime.
Police arrested Bowser Thursday and booked him into Pima County Jail on 14 criminal counts, including sexual assault, child molestation, sexual contact with a minor under age 15, kidnapping, child abuse, unlawfully introducing liquors to a minor and aggravated DUI.
Those with information about this incident should call 520-452-7500.
Tallahassee man accused of uploading videos containing child sex abuse
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WTXL) — A Tallahassee man is behind bars after deputies say he uploaded nearly a dozen child pornography videos to his DropBox account. Police say the man also may have been talking to child victims online.
According to an arrest report, the Leon County Sheriff's Office received a Cyber Tipline report from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children on Thursday.
Initially, the center received a report that an account had uploaded or shared at least three videos of a young boy performing sexually activities on an adult man. Investigators say the videos were uploaded on November 11, 2019.
During the investigation, the suspect's DropBox account information was identified through Center's Cyber Tipline. Further investigation determined that the server used to upload the videos came from a Comcast customer and linked it back to a specific home address in Tallahassee. That customer was identified as 23-year-old Jay Anderson.
Later that same day, a search warrant was executed at Anderson's home by LCSO, The Florida Department of Law Enforcement and Homeland and Security.
During a search of the home, authorities collected the Comcast router as evidence. Deputies say the router's data showed that "Jay's iPhone" had been previously connected to it.
Documents say deputies later found Anderson at another apartment complex on Hayden Road.
While being interviewed, Anderson admitted that he had "searched for child sexual abuse material through various methods." He also told deputies that he had solicited internet links of child pornography in multiple group chats.
After the interview, Anderson gave investigators consent to search his phone, where they found nearly a dozen of digital files containing inappropriate material involving children. Anderson admitted that he had also saved many of the files to his DropBox account.
"A preliminary examination of [Anderson's] cellphone shows that [Anderson] was chatting with individuals though electronic applications that appear, based on profile pictures, to possibly be child victims," investigators wrote in the report. "Further analysis and examination are required to confirm this information."
Based on the evidence, Anderson was arrested and transported to the Leon County Detention Facility.
As of Friday, he is being held in jail without bond on 10 counts of possession of obscene material and one count of child cruelty. Additional charges are expected to be filed against him.
No explanation for the child cruelty charge!
A California inmate serving a life sentence for murder confessed in a letter that he beat to death two child molesters
In a letter to the Bay Area News Group, Jonathan Watson, 41, said he clubbed both men in the head on Jan. 16 at the California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility and State Prison in the small central city of Corcoran.
The first attack occurred after Watson became enraged that the one of the sex offenders was watching a children’s television show, the Northern California newspaper group reported Thursday,
Prisoner David Bobb, 48, died that day. Graham De Luis-Conti, 62, died three days later at a hospital. Both were serving life sentences for aggravated sexual assault of a child under 14.
“We can’t comment on an active investigation,” Dana Simas, spokesman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, wrote in an email.
Watson is serving a life sentence for a 2009 murder conviction.
Days before the attack, he said his security classification was changed and he was transferred from a single-person cell to a lower-security dormitory pod at the Central Valley facility. Watson called the switch a “careless” mistake and said he had protested the decision.
Watson wrote that six days after he arrived at the prison, a child molester moved into the pod. Watson believed the man began taunting other inmates by watching children’s television programming. Watson said in the letter he couldn’t sleep that night “having not done what every instinct told me I should’ve done right then and there.”
Two hours before the attacks the next day, Watson told a prison counselor that he urgently needed to be transferred back to higher-level security “before I really (expletive) one of these dudes up,” but the counselor “scoffed and dismissed” him.
Watson said he returned to his housing pod.
“I was mulling it all over when along came Molester #1 and he put his TV right on PBS Kids again,” he wrote, according to the newspaper chain. “But this time, someone else said something to the effect of ‘Is this guy really going to watch this right in front of us?’ and I recall saying, ‘I got this.’ And I picked up the cane and went to work on him.”
Watson said he then left the housing pod to find a guard and turn himself in, but on the way, he saw “a known child trafficker, and I figured I’d just do everybody a favor,” Watson wrote. “In for a penny, in for a pound.”
Watson said he then told a guard, who didn’t believe him “until he looked around the corner and saw the mess I’d left in the dorm area,” Watson wrote.
Watson is in segregated housing while he is under investigation for the killings. He hasn’t been charged yet.
“Being a lifer, I’m in a unique position where I sometimes have access to these people and I have so little to lose,” Watson wrote. “And trust me, we get it, these people are every parents’ worst nightmare.”
I shouldn't like this guy as much as I do.
Boardman, Ore, man charged with child sex crimes
East Oregonian
MORROW COUNTY — A two-month investigation led to a Boardman man being arrested Wednesday on 13 charges of first-degree sex crimes.
The Boardman Police Department arrested Chaz Raymond Sewell, 36, at his residence after a Morrow County Grand Jury secretly indicted him on Tuesday for 11 counts of first-degree sex abuse and two counts of first-degree unlawful sexual penetration.
Boardman Police Chief Rick Stokoe said Detective Kyle Pearcy was the lead investigator on the case.
Sewell was arraigned in Morrow County Circuit Court in Heppner on Thursday and pleaded not guilty to all charges. As Measure 11 crimes, first-degree sex abuse carries a mandatory minimum of six years and three months, while first-degree unlawful sexual penetration carries a mandatory minimum of eight years and four months.
The secret indictment accuses Sewell of committing each of the crimes against a minor between Jan. 1, 2015, and Dec. 22, 2019.
Blue Mountain Defenders will be Sewell's court appointed representation when he next appears for a pretrial hearing in Heppner on March 5.
Sewell is currently lodged at the Umatilla County Jail in Pendleton. His bail is set at $2,750,000.
Cypress, Fla, man charged with sex abuse of a child
by: S. Brady Calhoun
CYPRESS, Fla. (WMBB) — Jackson County Sheriff’s investigators were joined by other agencies to hunt for and capture a man accused of sexual abuse against a child.
Investigators wrote that they received information that Phillippe Grant Davison, 38, of Cypress, was hiding in and out of abandoned homes and outbuildings near his home.
“The entire day was utilized by searching abandoned buildings, structures, residences, vehicles, and other locations,” deputies wrote. “Multiple interviews were conducted and constant surveillance of family properties was conducted throughout the day.”
He was captured at 12:30 a.m. on Friday.
Davison is charged with lewd or lascivious exhibition on a child and lewd or lascivious conduct on a child.
Middleburg, Fla, Sexual Predator Sentenced To More Than 16 Years For Possessing Depictions Of Child Sex Abuse
(STL.News) – U.S. District Judge Marcia Morales Howard has sentenced Richard Allan Griffin (59, Middleburg) to 16 years and 8 months in federal prison, followed by a life term of supervised release, for possessing images depicting the sexual abuse of children. The court also ordered Griffin to forfeit a cellphone and pay a $10,000 fine.
Griffin had pleaded guilty on October 29, 2019.
According to court documents, Griffin’s employer contacted law enforcement after discovering child sexual abuse materials on Griffin’s computer. The employer also turned over Griffin’s company issued cellphone to law enforcement. A forensic review of the phone revealed at least 25 images depicting children being sexually exploited, including images of children in bathing suits, underwear, and various stages of undress. It also contained images showing small children posing in a sexually suggestive manner. At least 10 of the images were classified as child pornography.
Griffin is a registered sexual predator and has four prior sex offenses involving children.
In 1996, in Lee County, he was convicted of two counts of attempted capital sexual battery on a person less than 12 years of age (a first degree felony), and a lewd/lascivious act (a felony in the second degree). Griffin was also convicted of cruelty to a child in Chatham County, Georgia, for performing sexual acts upon a child under the age of 8.
In 1990, Griffin was convicted of indecent exposure in Charleston County, South Carolina, after he exposed himself to a 15-year-old girl and offered to pay the child for sex. In 1992, in Chatham County, Georgia, Griffin was convicted of child molestation and loitering for sex after exposing himself to a child under the age of 14 and asking the child for sex.
“This convicted sexual predator did not learn his lesson the first time,” (or the 2nd, 3rd, or 4th), said HSI Jacksonville Assistant Special Agent in Charge K. Jim Phillips. “Now, as a result of the hard work of HSI special agents and our partners with the Clay County Sheriff’s Office Internet Crimes Against Children unit, this predator will no longer be a threat to our community.”
This case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations and the Clay County Sheriff’s Office. It was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Kelly S. Karase.
It is another case brought as part of Project Safe Childhood.
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