Cop Caught with Child Porn Serves 90 Days in Jail; Man Selling Weed Gets 5 Year Sentence

A former Ohio police officer will serve just 90 days in jail for child pornography charges while a Louisiana man will serve 5 years for conspiracy to distribute marijuana, according to a report from The Free Thought Project.

Last week, former Columbus, Ohio police sergeant Dean Worthington was sentenced to 9 years in prison after pleading guilty to four child pornography charges. But then the judge suspended all but 90 days of the sentence, to be served at the Franklin County Jail, because of Worthington’s history as a police officer. Worthington will also be required to pay a fine of $5,000 and register as a sex offender.

Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O’Brien said in a press release that Worthington had uploaded sexually explicit photographs of children to the website Tumblr. After the social media platform notified authorities, a search warrant was issued and authorities found six cell phones and other electronic devices that contained the pornographic images.

“This Columbus Police Sergeant was downloading child pornography to his personal cell phone,” O’Brien said. “This illegal behavior was discovered as a result of a tip Tumblr provided to law enforcement after Worthington uploaded an image of child pornography.”

“Between January and July of 2018, it is alleged that Worthington uploaded an image to Tumblr and downloaded multiple videos and images depicting young children engaging in sexual activity with adults,” O’Brien added.

Cathy Harper Lee, the executive director of the Ohio Crime Victim Justice Center, said that the sentence was too lenient.

“When offenders are only sentenced to 90 days in prison it sends a horrible message to crime victims, it sends a disturbing message to offenders, it undermines the serious nature of the crime and it allows that industry to flourish,” Lee said.

“Child pornography is a horrific crime that involves the production, distribution, and consumption of the images,” Lee added. “The children are sexually abused in order to produce the images. The images are distributed and redistributed to countless others—indefinitely, causing revictimization and long-term emotional trauma. This harm is magnified every time that material is circulated or downloaded. It’s time to take crimes against women and children seriously, especially child sexual abuse victims.”

Five Years for Pot

Meanwhile, last month Jabori Huntsberry was sentenced to 63 months in prison for marijuana distribution and other charges. Huntsberry had been convicted of mailing a package of marijuana from California to his neighbor’s house in Abbeville, Louisiana in 2014. Postal inspectors believed that he had been shipping cannabis from California to Louisiana, using different names and addresses. They also determined that $300,000 had been transferred to Huntsberry’s source of the marijuana in California.

Authorities initiated a controlled delivery of one of the packages and arrested Huntsberry after the package was accepted. U.S. Postal Service mail labels, money wire transfer receipts, two firearms, and handwritten records of pot transactions were discovered during a search of Huntsberry’s home.

Huntsberry was convicted in federal court of one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute marijuana, one count of unlawful use of a communication facility, one count of possession with intent to distribute marijuana, and one count of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. He will also be required to serve two years on parole after his release.