In March, Patrick Lewis Wojahn, the first openly homosexual mayor of his city of College Park, Md., who fancied himself a role model for LGBTQ youth, was arrested on dozens of counts of possessing and distributing child pornography.
On Monday, he was sentenced to 30 years after having pled guilty in August to 140 counts related to the possession and distribution of child sexual abuse material.
"His indictment charged him with possession, possession with intent to distribute and distribution of material that exploits children — a mixture of misdemeanors and felonies with maximum penalties ranging from five to 10 years’ incarceration,” reports the Baltimore Sun. "Prince George’s County Circuit Judge Karen H. Mason on Monday sentenced him to 150 years in prison but suspended all but 30 years of it, according to the Prince George’s County State’s Attorney’s Office and online court records. That means that if Wojahn violates the conditions of his eventual release, a judge could send him back to prison for up to 120 years."
The judge added five years of supervised probation upon his release, and Wojahn will have to register as a sex offender. Under Maryland state law, he’ll be eligible for parole after 25% of his sentence, roughly seven and a half years.
Prince George’s County State’s Attorney Aisha N. Braveboy lauded Wojahn’s sentence.
“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,” Braveboy told the Baltimore Sun. “No child deserves to be sexually abused. No child deserves for their images to be displayed on the internet or any platform for hundreds or thousands or possibly millions of people to view.”
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Wojahn was a frequent visitor to the White House, having attended LGBTQ events that Joe Biden hosted. Wojahn described Biden as “the most pro-LGBTQ President in U.S. history!” Wojahn and his partner were also invited to Biden’s signing of the Respect for Marriage Act on the South Lawn of the White House.
Wojahn also boasted about being “mentored” by Pete Buttigieg after the two met in 2015 at the U.S. Conference of Mayors winter meeting in Washington, D.C., where Wojahn explained that Buttigieg “was assigned to be my buddy.”
The two men discussed “the difficulties of being an openly gay mayor, with Buttigieg sharing with his mentee the story of his coming out while serving in office,” he explained in a 2019 interview. They have maintained a good relationship since then.
Hey, @PeteButtigieg…
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) November 21, 2023
Your good pal and mentee just received a 30-year prison sentence over a child p*rn case involving 500 victims.
Any comment? pic.twitter.com/hB97pHcXcb
Assistant State’s Attorney Monica Meyers stated in a press briefing that on Wojahn's cellphone alone, investigators discovered videos and images depicting the exploitation of over 500 children. Utilizing a collaborative effort with child abuse investigators globally, detectives and prosecutors successfully identified 52 of the exploited children. Several victims shared impact statements, which prosecutors presented during the court proceedings.
“This is not a victimless crime,” Meyers said. “It impacts these children today and for the rest of their lives.”
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