Published: July 23, 2008 11:26 pm            

Feds: Hindson corresponded with victims

Former KHS swim coach admits to online alias, approaches

INDIANAPOLIS — Brian Hindson told federal agents he wanted to be the “best voyeur” in an online community of individuals obsessed with child pornography. Now he faces up to 35 years in prison for his actions.

The former Kokomo High School swim coach formally pleaded guilty Wednesday to 16 felony counts of producing, distributing and possessing child pornography, charges that could put him in jail for the rest of his life when he’s sentenced Oct. 17.

Hindson’s plea was expected. He and federal prosecutors signed off on a plea agreement last month, and made his formal plea of guilty to all 16 charges in a hearing Wednesday before U.S. Southern District Court Judge Larry McKinney.

McKinney will decide Oct. 17 whether to accept or reject the plea agreement.

But Wednesday brought a new twist in the case, as prosecutors for the first time laid out all the evidence obtained against Hindson in a case that took more than two years to complete.

The bombshell came from FBI Special Agent Emily Odom, who testified under oath that Hindson did more than just secretly tape girls undressing in the locker rooms at Memorial Gym and the Kokomo High School South Campus.

Odom said Hindson also created an online alias and contacted five of his 11 victims in an attempt to solicit more revealing pictures from the underage girls.

Posing as a teenage male swimmer named “Matt Kennsington,” Hindson corresponded online with his victims, the girls he’d secretly taped.

One of the victims told Odom she’d been approached online by “Matt Kennsington,” who told the girl he’d seen her in her swimsuit, and the sight “made him think dirty thoughts,” Odom testified.

Hindson, posing as “Matt Kennsington,” also corresponded with one of the victims, who was 16 years old at the time, for more than a year, Odom said. The girl is identified in court records as “Jane Doe No. 4.”

Kokomo Police Lt. Don Whitehead, who investigated the case with Odom, said it doesn’t appear Hindson ever attempted to physically contact any of the victims.

But posing as “Matt Kennsington,” Hindson managed to get Jane Doe No. 4 to send him pictures in which she was depicted engaging in sexually explicit conduct, Odom said.

Odom said the girl sent the pictures to Hindson online through an instant messaging program.

Nothing else was mentioned in her testimony of any of the other 10 victims sending any compromising materials to Hindson. Odom declined to make further statements after the hearing Wednesday.

“He said he did it to see how far [the victims] would go,” Odom said during her testimony. “He said that to him, it was just a game.”

She said Hindson belonged to a Yahoo! online group dedicated to voyeurism, and told her he “wanted to be the best at voyeurism.”

Odom said Hindson shared the visual images he’d obtained of his victims with members of his online network.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Steve DeBrota said Wednesday there is a continuing investigation as to where the images Hindson distributed online ended up. Hindson’s cooperation with that investigation is one of the conditions of his plea agreement.

Investigators also said Hindson possessed numerous child pornography images he’d taken from file-sharing sites where pedophiles made images available for downloading.

Police believe Hindson was engaged in secretly taping his victims — who were between 13 and 17 years old when they were taped — between 1998 and 2007.

He was caught when he sold an old computer in 2005 to a woman and her son through eBay. The woman’s son found two video files still on the computer’s hard drive, showing underage girls undressing, seemingly without their knowledge. They contacted the FBI.

Whitehead said the new information released in court Wednesday was part of the reason prosecutors insisted Hindson receive between 25 and 35 years in federal prison, and be placed on supervised release for the rest of his life if he ever completes his sentence.

“I think it just illustrates how perverted [Hindson] really is,” Whitehead said Wednesday. “If secretly videotaping girls in the locker room wasn’t perverted enough, he was led to make contact with them, to gain something else from them … just to see how far they would go.”

In court Wednesday, Hindson, pale and unshaven, wearing a Marion County Jail jumpsuit and his salt-and-pepper hair shaved close, did not look at the victims’ families seated behind him.

Neither Hindson nor his attorney made any comment after the hearing. Hindson replied “yes, sir” clearly to each of the questions posed by the judge. Hindson waived his right to a trial, admitted to the allegations made by Odom in her testimony, and said “guilty” when the judge asked how he pleaded to the 16 charges against him.

McKinney now awaits a pre-sentencing report from the U.S. Probation Department, which could factor into the judge’s decision on the plea agreement.

If McKinney rejects the plea deal, which isn’t expected, then both Hindson and the prosecution would both be free to opt out of the agreement. If that happened, a new plea agreement could be arranged, or the case could proceed to trial.

If Hindson was tried on all 16 charges, he could face a maximum sentence of 420 years in prison. And his conviction in federal court would not preclude him being prosecuted in state court at a later date.

The Oct. 17 sentencing hearing will be held at 2:30 p.m. in his courtroom on the second floor of the U.S. Southern District Court in Indianapolis.

If McKinney accepts the plea, the victims’ families will have a chance to be heard before McKinney hands down the sentence, as will Hindson.

“For 10 years, Mr. Hindson exploited the children he was entrusted to teach and protect but that exploitation ends today,” Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Friedrich said Wednesday. “Those who consider producing or distributing child pornography should expect to face prosecution.”

Scott Smith may be reached at (765) 454-8569 or via e-mail at scott.smith@kokomotribune.com

        

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