Bossip Video

What in the hell is wrong with this world? Please don’t let him out on the streets to “receive treatment.”

An Iowa teen was caught in a child porn sting along with other people. Kraigen Groom was charged for the pornography, but the police also stumbled upon him committing some of the sick acts in the videos.

NYDAILY:

The family of an Iowa baby subjected to molestation on video didn’t want her abuser “to go to prison or serve significant jail time,” prosecutors said Thursday.

Kraigen Grooms, 19, pleaded guilty to engaging in a lascivious act with a child and avoided more time behind bars in a 10-year suspended sentence handed down Monday. Observers nationwide raised questions about the lack of prison time for the onetime subject of a federal manhunt.

Wapello County Attorney Gary Oldenburger defended the plea deal in a statement Thursday in an effort, he said, to correct “grossly inaccurate” information being spread about the case.

The three-page memo also revealed new details about the case, such as the wishes of the family of the 1-year-old baby girl who he said was the victim of Grooms’ crime.

“One of the most significant factors affecting the outcome of this case was that the parents of the victim did not wish Grooms to go to prison or serve significant jail time,” Oldenburger said. “Their primary concern was that he receive treatment.”

Oldenburger cited other factors, including Grooms’ status as a 16-year-old juvenile at the time of the crime and a sex-crimes psychologist who called him a low risk for future offenses.

He said “certain websites” who described what Grooms did as “raping a toddler” had gotten it wrong.

“The child was not injured, no pain was inflicted, and the child was too young to even be aware of what was happening,” Oldenburger said. “The child suffered no ill effects as a result of Grooms’ actions.”

Grooms had served 860 days in jail by the time he pleaded guilty and gained his release under supervision in July. Credit for time served would have enabled him to qualify for parole from Iowa’s overcrowded prison system “in a very short time,” Oldenburger said.

The suspended term includes five years of probation, a sex offender treatment program, DNA sampling and lifetime registration as a sex offender. Judge Randy Degeest also required Grooms to “be supervised on parole for life” as part of the sentence, Oldenburger noted.

He also revealed that Grooms had not filmed the sex act with a baby girl himself or even known it was on video. Investigators from the Department of Homeland Security had said in March 2014 that “John Doe” posted screenshots of the video on an underground child pornography website.

Police in Ottumwa, roughly 85 miles southeast of Des Moines, arrested Grooms a day after the DHS agents asked for the public’s help in locating “John Doe.” He faced up to 25 years in prison at the time.

Yet Oldenburger said on Thursday that Grooms had been lured into the molestation. Two child pornographers from New Orleans and Ireland were posing as teens and convincing children like Grooms to perform sex acts on Skype calls they recorded and distributed, he said.

Grooms actually believed he was speaking with a teenage girl, according to Oldenburger. The child pornographers, posing as the girl, told him what he had done was “so hot” and asked him to do more, but he would not commit any more sexual abuse, Oldenburger said.

“The abuse was committed at the behest of two men who had, over a long period of time, perfected a technique for duping children into committing sexual acts that they would not otherwise have engaged in,” Oldenburger said.

“They were so skillful and so persuasive in their efforts that they successfully convinced hundreds of children to engage in sexual activity while they surreptitiously recorded it.”

Oldenburger said the nature of crime prevented investigators from providing more information to the public. Prosecutors needed to ensure the identity of the victims and witnesses in the case remained confidential, he said.

“When dealing with the kids of situations we often deal with, there is no possible way to reach a resolution that is satisfactory to everyone involved,” Oldenburger said. “There will be times when some citizens do not understand or do not agree with how a case is resolved.”

This seems like a white privilege thing because after pleading guilty to the molestation charges… Kraigen Groom should of been sentenced and not “helped” just like they would’ve done if he was black.

NYDAILY

Comments

Bossip Comment Policy
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.