Two weekends before Christmas, and all through the house are a few too many child porn-related arrests and activities, including a firefighter busted for child porn, a school bus driver quitting over a child porn investigation, and a Virginia sheriff's deputy arrested for child porn. Among others.
The firefighter was 14-year Crowley (Louisiana) Fire Dept. veteran Edward Ruddock, who was arrested December 10, following an investigation by the Louisiana Attorney General's Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, which turned up child porn images at the fire department station where Ruddock worked.
Ruddock faces from two to 10 years in prison if convicted, without probation or parole.
The school bus driver's identity was not released to the press following word that he was the target of a Pittsfield, Massachusetts child porn probe, but a published report indicated he was well thought of with a reputation for school bus safety and over 25 years' experience. Officials including school superintendent William Travis stressed that the driver was never believed to have handled or indulged child porn on the job.
The Virginia Beach (Va.) sheriff's deputy, Alfred Cope, was arrested December 8 by Virginia Beach police's computer crimes unit officers, when they reportedly learned Cope accessed child porn Web sites and visited him at home, where they were said to have received information that provoked Cope's arrest. He's free on bond pending an as yet-undetermined court date.
In addition to these cases, Thomas Mickelson of Dubuque, Iowa pleaded guilty late last week to receiving child porn, admitting he downloaded child porn that included sadomasochistic imagery of children, in December 2000. He faces a maximum 15 years in prison and $250,000 fine.
Also, Montell Bridgewater of Olive Branch, Mississippi, was arrested last week after he let the FBI search a Memphis storage bin he rented, where the bureau reportedly turned up numerous images of Bridgewater having sex with two minor females between 6 and 8 years old. Authorities reportedly told the press Bridgewater confessed to making the photos with his own Polaroid. The case began when the storage facility's owner complained after spotting the photographs when Bridgewater fell behind in his rental payments.
Bridgewater could face up to 10 years behind bars and a $250,000 fine if convicted.
Concurrently, South Africa became the latest country to vow a crackdown on child porn. This came last week after reports that the government determined over 40 South African children are raped per day, provoking the country's Ministry of Home Affairs to launch a child porn hotline and call for tougher sentencing against child porn possessors and distributors, and child molesters.
That call followed Deputy Minister Malusi Gigaba's denunciation of a six-year sentence for a schoolteacher who used children in "obscene sexual activities." Gigaba said the sentence was not enough and called for concurrent mandatory registration for such convicts as sex offenders ineligible for future employment involving work with children.
But then there's at least one child porn convict who got a sentence cut – because he told a court he did it not for himself but to get even with his boss.
David Peter Allan Jubb had been sentenced to 12 months behind bars earlier this fall for downloading over 100 child porn images onto a company laptop owned by Communicare. He told Burwood Local Court in Sydney that he didn't do it for himself but for revenge – he said he was convinced his boss, Carter Robinson, would take the fall.
