Posted on 02/09/2006 6:14:17 PM PST by NormsRevenge
SAN DIEGO – A pedophile who was part of the international child pornography ring that exchanged videos and photos of themselves molesting children was sentenced Thursday to more than 467 years to life in state prison.
Paul Whitmore, a former counselor for autistic children, was convicted Nov. 30 of 51 felony charges, including committing a lewd act on a child, aggravated sexual assault on a child, posing a minor for pictures involving sexual conduct for commercial purposes and attempting to dissuade a witness from reporting a crime.
The verdicts included special allegations of bondage, sodomy, sexual penetration, oral copulation and multiple victims.
One of Whitmore's photos showed a tied-up 9-year-old drinking water out of a cat bowl, said prosecutor Jeffrey Dort.
"He used children to satisfy himself," Dort told Judge Gale Kaneshiro. "His premeditated crime is worse than the person who murders on instinct."
Whitmore's crimes included eight victims, none of whom were students at Stein Education Center in Grantville, where he worked.
The victims who were forced to testify at trial were put through hell, Dort told the judge.
He said Whitmore, 47, had shown no remorse for his crimes.
"We can only assume from that ... the worst," the prosecutor said.
Before she pronounced sentence, Kaneshiro denied Whitmore's motions for a new trial and to impose one life sentence.
The evidence presented to the jury was "graphic, shocking and overwhelming," the judge said.
Kaneshiro said the photos and videos produced by Whitmore was the most incriminating evidence to prove his guilt.
She called Whitmore a sexual abuser, child molester and pedophile who documented his sexual assaults through video and photographs.
"He is a pedophile by self examination and self declaration," the judge said of Whitmore. "He is the worst that I have ever sentenced."
Whitmore acted on his sexual impulses, molesting children of both sexes, Kaneshiro said.
In denying probation on some counts, the judge said rehabilitation for the defendant was not feasible.
Kaneshiro said she imposed consecutive sentences on many of the counts because the degree of cruelty and callousness went above and beyond similar crimes of violence.
Whitmore also induced others in the pornography ring to molest children, the judge said.
Over several years, Whitmore "groomed" a number of children – including one he was a caretaker for – into a "circle of hell," in which they were molested and had their photos taken and posted on the Internet, Dort said.
The defendant's desire to have sex with children was topped only by his passion to create a library of child pornography that was distributed around the world, the prosecutor said.
Dort pulled out a pair of handcuffs, a black leather restraint and rope that Whitmore used on his young victims, calling the defendant a "monster."
"He showed porn to children in his own house," Dort told the judge. "The crime fits the punishment."
Another man, Brooke Rowland, pleaded guilty to two counts of child molestation and was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison.
Whitmore and Rowland, a 44-year-old former ad salesman from Poway, were among 25 people arrested in North America and Europe in April 2002 in connection with "Operation Hamlet."
The child porn ring focused on individuals authorities said were distributing photos and videos on the Internet of themselves molesting children as young as 3 years old in 2000 and 2001.
A watchdog group in Sweden surfing the Web identified an offender and notified police in Denmark, Dort said earlier.
More than 100 children were identified as being abused during the investigation, and 45 of them were taken out of offenders' homes, the prosecutor said.
One more democrat party activist behind bars. If it were Vermont he would have got 60 days in jail.
What's the matter with that judge anyway? Doesn't she know that punishment doesn't work? Or at least that's what that judge in Vermont says.
Ping.
Sometimes I assume the worst about courts in California. But it looks like the court has got this one right.
Talk about polar opposites!
Perhaps, justice will still be served...in prison, by prisoners.
As long as he's not related to Methuselah or Gilgamesh, we don't need to worry.
Good
He'll be up for parole in only 234 years...
This prick is still alive?
Aw shucks! I was disappointed. When I read the title of this thread I thought it was Jacko.
"But it looks like the court has got this one right."
Mr. Buick, I must humbly disagree. The court was way off, as death would have fit this crime.
The JUDGE rocks "the judge said rehabilitation for the defendant was not feasible. "
Nice to see these scumbags getting locked up. And how about "Brooke" the former "ad salesman"? Yeah, he's gonna have an interesting time in the joint;)
Utterly disgusting!
Yeah, I thought about that after I hit the "post" button.
You're right, of course. I'm sorry that it wasn't an option for this court. The judge did the best she could.
Once word gets around in the prison, unless the dude is put into solitary confinement, life sentence will probably exist for about a year.
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