KENTUCKY
Courier-Journal
Andrew Wolfson, @adwolfson May 23, 2016
More than 30 years after he was repeatedly abused by a Catholic priest in Louisville, a man has been sentenced to 30 years in prison for using two boys to manufacture child pornography.
Michael Mudd’s lawyer pleaded for leniency, noting that “abuse begets abuse begets abuse.”
The attorney, Chief Federal Public Defender Scott Wendelsdorf, said in a pre-sentencing memo that while there is never an excuse for criminal sexual conduct, “occasionally there is an explanation and that explanation justifies a degree of mercy not otherwise warranted.”
“This is such a case,” Wendelsdorf said, asking that Mudd get 15 years, the mandatory minimum.
But Assistant U.S. Attorney Jo Lawless noted that plenty of children who are sexually abused don’t go on to abuse others. And Senior U.S. District Judge Thomas B. Russell said that while Mudd’s own abuse was unfortunate, the public still has to be protected and he still needed to be punished.
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