Former LGBT Activist Democrat Maryland Mayor, Mentored by Buttigieg, Receives 30 Years in Child Porn Case
A judge sentenced a former College Park, Maryland, mayor, known for his LGBT activism and mentored by Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, to 30 years after he pleaded guilty to 140 child pornography charges.
Some of the photos and videos included infants.
Patrick Wojahn received 150 years, but the judge suspended 120 of them. He is eligible for parole in 7.5 years:
Patrick Wojahn, who resigned as mayor of College Park, Maryland, on March 2 before his arrest, pleaded guilty to 140 charges related to child pornography as part of a deal struck with prosecutors. He was sentenced to 150 years total, with all but 30 years suspended, but still will be eligible for parole in 7.5 years under state law, The Washington Post reported. The conviction came after investigators linked an account sharing illicit images to his government email address.”I do sense the remorsefulness,” Prince George’s County Circuit Court Judge Karen Mason said of Wojahn on Monday during an emotional hearing when prosecutors read hours of victim impact statements. “And I do know you take responsibility.”
30 years, but eligible for parole in 7.5 years.
State’s Attorney Aisha Braveboy described Wojahn’s sentence as “instructive.” I don’t know why: “It instructs us that child pornography is not simply about images, it’s about the pain behind the images, the tragedies that have occurred in these young people’s lives, that should never have happened to them.”
According to court documents, Wojahn used the social media site Kik to upload and distribute child pornography.Back in February, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children notified the Prince George’s County Police Department that a social media account in the county distributed suspected child pornography in January. Police said they investigated the matter and found the social media account with the screen name “skippy_md” belonged to Wojahn. Investigators believe Wojahn used a virtual private network (VPN) to mask his location when accessing the social media account.Investigators linked the social media account to Wojahn after a subpoena revealed that his College Park government email address was listed as the recovery email for the account. They also discovered Wojahn’s phone number and home IP address were linked to the account.
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