A 66-year-old Portola Valley man who allegedly had images of young girls engaged in sexual activity on his computer was sentenced yesterday to eight months in jail on one count of felony child pornography possession.
Stephen Wolf pleaded no contest to the charge in March on the condition of no state prison. He had originally been charged with two felonies but his defense attorney argued that all the pornography was downloaded on one occasion which, under the law, would result in one count for the incidence rather than a count for each image.
Wolf must also register as a sex offender for life, spend three years on supervised probation and pay standard fines and fees. He does not need to report to the jail until Feb. 1 and has credit of one day against his term.
Authorities arrested Wolf in March 2012 as part of a countywide child pornography sweep that took 10 men into custody. The sweep was the result of a Silicon Valley ICAC Task Force investigation. The task force targets peer-to-peer file sharing online, evolving from previous investigations when suspects often were identified through chat room decoy operations, according to police.
In Wolf’s case, prosecutors say a search warrant at his Portola Valley home turned up a computer containing the images of nude girls 6 to 12 years age engaged in sexual activity.
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Of the other men arrested, one has since committed suicide, another had his case dropped for insufficient evidence and others received sentences between eight and 16 months.
Wolf’s sentence is “in the reasonable range,” said District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe.
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Keep the discussion civilized. Absolutely NO personal attacks or insults directed toward writers, nor others who make comments.
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