United States Attorney Leura G. Canary Middle District of Alabama

TWO CHILD PREDATORS RECEIVE LONG SENTENCES IN FEDERAL PRISON

Millbrook Man Sentenced to Over 24 Years in Prison
for Producing Child Pornography

MONTGOMERY, AL.— Today U.S. District Judge Mark E. Fuller sentenced Joshua Wayne Hester, age 22, of Millbrook, Ala., to 292 months in federal prison for producing child pornography, announced U.S. Attorney Leura G. Canary. Judge Fuller also sentenced Hester to lifetime supervised release upon his release from prison.

On November 20, 2006, Hester pled guilty to an Information charging him with prduction of child pornography. According to the Information and other court documents, between January 2005 and May 2005, Hester caused two girls to engage in sexual intercourse with him for the purpose of taking pictures of the conduct. At the time, Hester was 20 and the girls were 13 and 14, respectively. Hester stored the photographs on CDs and on a Yahoo photo album. The conduct came to light when Hester’s then-girlfriend found the CDs and called police.

Former Millbrook Teacher Receives Ten Year Sentence
For Possession of Child Pornography

In a separate case today, Judge Fuller sentenced defendant Daniel L. Platt, age 50, of Millbrook, Ala., to imprisonment for ten years and lifetime supervised release. Platt pled guilty to possession of child pornography in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama on March 2, 2007. Platt was formerly a teacher at Millbrook Middle School. Platt admitted to possessing hundreds of images of children engaged in sexually explicit activities. These images were found on his laptop computer.

Platt is also facing charges at the state level for sexual abuse and sodomy of an 11-year-old girl who was not a student or former student of Platt’s. Platt was arrested for those charges on March 7, 2006. The state case is being prosecuted by District Attorney Randall Houston. The sexual abuse charge is a class C felony punishable by a sentence of one year and a day to up to 10 years. Sodomy is a class A felony punishable by a sentence of 10 years to life.

“Today was a good day in our fight against the sexual abuse of children,” stated U.S. Attorney Leura Canary. “We received long prison sentences for a man who preyed on underage girls and photographed his sex acts with them, and for another man, formerly a middle school teacher and also accused of child molestation, who collected hundreds of images of child sexual abuse. These defendants will serve almost all of their federal sentences, and their communities will be safer for children during their absence.

Both cases were brought as part of Project Safe Childhood. In May 2006, the Department of Justice launched Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by United States Attorneys’ Offices, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov/.

Both of these cases were investigated by the Millbrook Police Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The Platt case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Tommie Brown Hardwick. The Hester case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew O. Schiff, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Tommie Brown Hardwick handled the sentencing today.