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Monday, May 22, 2017

Berlin Man Sentenced to 36 Years in Federal Prison for Production of Child Pornography

Baltimore, Maryland – U.S. District Judge Ellen L. Hollander sentenced David Edward Weatherholtz, age 57, of Berlin, Maryland today to 36 years in prison, followed by a lifetime of supervised release, for production of child pornography. Judge Hollander also ordered that Weatherholtz pay a total of $105,471.12 in restitution to the victims and ordered that Weatherholtz forfeit certain property, including his interest in the commercial real estate property located at 12600 Marjan Lane, Ocean City, MD 21842.

The sentence was announced by Acting United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Stephen M. Schenning; Special Agent in Charge Andre R. Watson of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI); Worcester County Sheriff Reggie T. Mason, Sr.; Worcester County State’s Attorney Beau Oglesby; and Colonel William M. Pallozzi, Superintendent of the Maryland State Police.

According to his plea agreement, from at least August 1990 through his arrest in 2015, Weatherholtz had sexual contact and/or sexual intercourse with at least four minors.

On December 3, 2014, an undercover detective with the Worcester County Sheriff’s Office responded to a sexually explicit ad placed on an internet website. Records obtained from the website identified Weatherholtz as the person who posted the advertisement and further indicated that the ad was one of many posted by Weatherholtz from 2009 to December 2014 for the purpose of meeting young males interested in sex.

Weatherholtz and the undercover detective exchanged emails and text messages, in which the detective identified himself as a 13-year-old deaf white male who lived with his aunt in Snow Hill. Weatherholtz sent the detective two video files by text messages. In the first video file Weatherholtz depicted himself greeting the purported 13-year-old deaf male, and in the second video file he pretended to be the 13-year-old deaf male greeting Weatherholtz.

Weatherholtz arranged to meet the purported 13-year-old male at a restaurant in Snow Hill on December 16, 2014, and indicated that he would bring the boy back to his residence. When Weatherholtz arrived at the meeting location, he was taken into custody. A search warrant was also executed at his home and law enforcement seized numerous computers, hard drives, and other media storage devices. Subsequent forensic analysis of those items recovered numerous still photographs and a video of Weatherholtz engaged in sexually explicit conduct with a minor male victim.

On August 17, 2016, an employee at a building formerly owned by Weatherholtz found a box on the property that was addressed to “Aaron Weatherholtz” – the defendant’s dog. Inside the box were photos of minor males engaged in sex acts; sheets of paper called “official progress charts” that depicted dated, hand-traced outlines of erect male penises; CDs and DVDs; and two VHS-compatible camcorder cassette tapes. A review of that material revealed three other minor male victims engaged in sexually explicit conduct.

Acting United States Attorney Stephen M. Schenning commended HSI Baltimore, Worcester County Sheriff’s Office, Worcester County State’s Attorney’s Office, Maryland State Police, and the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force for their work in the investigation. Mr. Schenning thanked Assistant U.S. Attorneys Ayn B. Ducao and Paul A. Riley, who prosecuted the case.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good....hope he rots there.

Anonymous said...

Yuk!

Anonymous said...

36 months? Fail

Anonymous said...

My fault read it wrong 36 years is more like it

Anonymous said...

So can any rationale mind tell me how someone incarcerated can pay any fines???? Other than taking 5 cents a day off for being in jail???

Anonymous said...

They pay by whatever means necessary, including selling off personal property and emptying bank and investment accounts.

Anonymous said...

Think about it for a moment. Child Pornography gets a person 36 years in prison but leaking classified information on a home-brewed server while giving foreign hostiles access to our government warrants no time at all? Not even a trial? People WTF up. Every American should be beating on the DOJ's doors to have Hillary Clinton AND Bill prosecuted for treason and a host of other crimes before, during and since they were in the White House.

Anonymous said...

He got off easy, IMHO.

Anonymous said...

He will get all the porn he can handle in the "pokie"!!!!!

Anonymous said...

1:08:
They will kill him first. The scum of the earth in prisons consider offenders like this pig beneath even themselves.
The rest of his life will be a nightmare, and rightly so.
This is true justice.

Anonymous said...

This is a sickness for which there is NO CURE. They cannot stop once they have started and the children NEVER recover from the abuse. I would love to see life in prison for this pervert.

Anonymous said...

First off, he has probably been gay for a very long time now and never came out of the closet. He is going into a Federal prison which are more like Country Clubs than anything else. He will not be put in with killers, etc so he will have a safe stay there until his death.