43
Austintown man gets 2 1/2 years in prison for child porn
YOUNGSTOWN
An Austintown man has been sentenced to 21/2 years in prison and fined $500 for possessing images of children in graphic sexual situations.
Milbur Stout, 44, of North Kimberly Avenue, drew the sentence Wednesday from Judge James C. Evans of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.
Stout had been charged with 42 counts of pandering obscenity or sexually-oriented material involving a minor and four counts of illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material between 2006 and 2011.
Stout entered an Alford plea in January to two counts of pandering sexually oriented material and two counts of illegal use of a minor in nudity- oriented material.
An Alford plea meant Stout maintained his innocence but acknowledged that prosecutors had enough evidence to obtain a conviction in a trial.
However, at Wednesday’s hourlong sentencing hearing, Stout apologized for his conduct and said he accepts full responsibility for his actions.
Stout possessed photos in a box in his home of sexual material involving children, according to Natasha Frenchko, an assistant county prosecutor.
Stout’s lawyer, Scott Cochran, told the judge his client tore up the photos years ago, but acknowledged possessing the pieces of the images. Cochran called for probation with community- based sex-offender treatment for his client, who he said had no criminal record, other than two drunken-driving charges.
Stout told the judge he had been abused physically and sexually as a child and stumbled across a website featuring nude children in the late 1990s.
That brought back the memories of his own abuse as a child, he said, adding that he felt sorry for the children depicted.
Stout said he had considered turning the images over to authorities, but, instead, “destroyed or erased every bit of what I had collected,” 10 years ago. “I thought I had put it all behind me,” he said.
Stout’s property, then located in Jackson Township, was sold at auction, and the new owners found the images and turned them over to police on March 30, 2011, Frenchko said in a court filing.
Frenchko recommended the maximum sentence — a five-year prison term for Stout. “He certainly did contribute to the continued victimization of all the minor children who were depicted,” she said. “He’s not the victim. He’s the defendant here. He did commit these crimes,” she told the judge.
An unusual turn of events led to the plea deal, Frenchko said.
Most of the charges pertained to material on a floppy disk that had been in Stout’s possession, but not associated with any particular computer.
Without a computer, prosecutors couldn’t determine when the material was downloaded and therefore couldn’t establish whether the statute of limitations for criminal prosecution had expired, she explained.
Stout will be on supervised release for five years after he leaves prison and must register as a sex offender with the local sheriff every six months for 25 years after his release.
The case was investigated by Detective Brian Newhard of the Jackson Township Police Department.