Truemors
This is really disturbing. As a father I am very concerned about this issue as well as the fact that so many people in responsible positions are found guilty of this makes it hard for me not to wonder if my own child, or my neighbours family is being affected. Why there is not more research trying to find out why adults, Christian talk show hosts, republican pundits, government employees or otherwise harbour these exploitative and dangerous drives to covet children who cannot defend themselves from such attacks.
For those who talk of a return to yesteryear, back in the good old, bad old days children were seen and not heard. Thankfully such abuses are now brought out into the light of day and subject to public scrutiny.
- The Angryindian
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Gregory C. Kapordelis, authorities contend, is the personification of the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde character.In public, Kapordelis was a respected anesthesiologist from Gainesville, a commerce club member and a volunteer at youth summer camps.
In private, the U.S. Attorney's Office said, he was a "monster" who drugged, molested and photographed young boys left in his care and downloaded onto his home computers more than 10,000 sexually explicit images of children.
The 46-year-old doctor was sentenced Tuesday to 35 years in federal prison for producing, receiving and possessing child pornography.
U.S. Attorney David Nahmias said he was "heartened" by the sentence, saying it would keep Kapordelis from "harming young boys again."
The doctor's lawyer, Don Samuel, said he would appeal.
Either way, the counts that prosecutors were able to convict Kapordelis on represent a significantly watered-down case compared with the allegations leveled against him three years ago.
Kapordelis was originally charged with traveling to a hotel in St. Petersburg, Russia, to have sex with children — making him one of the first people arrested under a new U.S. "sex tourism" law.
Those charges were eventually dropped. The government did not say why.
During the trial, prosecutors presented as evidence a grainy video of Kapordelis allegedly having sex with a skinny young male in the Czech Republic.
Jurors did not find him guilty of making the video.
The doctor said he wanted
to be tried on the case built in Russia, saying it was so fraught with
error that jurors would begin to question the current case. He accused
agents of committing perjury, hotel employees of extorting him and
witnesses of changing their stories."For three years, right up until the time of sentencing, the court
and the government refused to consider any of the evidence from Russia
that unequivocally disproved the allegations that spawned this
prosecution," lawyer Samuel said Tuesday night.The government focused, instead, on the images recovered from the doctor's three home computers.
He was convicted of pulling down the underwear of a 14-year-old boy
and photographing him after he passed out from alcohol Kapordelis gave
him.A relative testified that Kapordelis took indecent pictures of his 11-year-old son during a trip to Greece.
At the end of the three-week trial, Kapordelis was found guilty of
three counts of using a minor to produce a sexually explicit image, two
counts of receiving child pornography and one count of possessing it.Because he was tried in federal court, Kapordelis cannot be paroled.
And unless he wins his appeal, he will remain behind bars until he is
81.
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