Free Republic

CLEVELAND (AP) — Federal prosecutors say a Boy Scout leader recorded boys changing clothes before and after swimming at a YMCA, his home's bathroom and inside teepees at an Ohio scout reservation. Thirty-nine-year-old Thomas Close, of Shelby in central Ohio's Richland County, was arrested and indicted Thursday on sexual exploitation of children and receiving and distributing child pornography charges.

SALT LAKE CITY — A former Boy Scout leader and hospital employee will go to prison for collecting and making child pornography. Third District Judge Robin Reese on Monday sentenced Shawn Thomas Whiting, 34, to a one- to-15-year prison term on four second-degree felony counts of sexual exploitation of a minor. Whiting pleaded guilty to the charges in April. He originally faced a total of 20 counts of the same charge, but the 16 additional counts were dismissed in exchange for the man's plea. Reese ordered the man to pay for the cost of counseling for his victims. The Utah...

An embattled Mayor Jim West, facing Spokane media for the first time in the month-long sexual misconduct scandal at City Hall, vowed not to resign and to pay for his own legal defense – even borrowing money from his elderly father if necessary. "I can still continue to be an effective mayor … . I never violated my oath of office, and I never used my office in violation of the law or for any personal gain," West said. West singled out two powerful Democrats – former Washington Gov. Mike Lowry and ex-President Bill Clinton – for surviving sex scandals...

GAINESVILLE - A former Scout master with the Boy Scouts of America who also works for the state's child welfare agency was arrested on charges of raping a boy in his troop. Hugh Eric Self, 35, was charged with sexually abusing the child, now 12, several times between November 2002 and July, Alachua County Sheriff's Sgt. Keith Faulk said. Self was held in the Alachua County jail with no bail set Saturday. He was arrested Friday. According to the arrest report, Self met the boy, then 8, through Scouting events and the boy was later in his Scout troop. The...