Wednesday, August 05, 2009

Henry Elbert Edgington testified Tuesday that he was on a 10-month personal crusade to cleanse the Internet of child pornography sites when Waco police interrupted his quest in August 2007 before he could contact a local congressman for help.

The 63 images of child pornography found on Edgington’s work computer at the Czech Inn in West and other photos discovered in a padlocked black box in his bathroom and car were evidence of research the part-time minister at Elm Mott Church of Christ was conducting before taking his one-man war against online child pornography to U.S. Rep. Chet Edwards, D-Waco, Edgington testified.

Prosecutors J.R. Vicha and Hilary LaBorde and defense attorney Seth Sutton rested their cases Tuesday afternoon and will give jury summations this morning. The 54th State District Court jury of seven men and five women should begin deliberations before noon.

Edgington, 65, of China Spring, is on trial on nine counts of possession of child pornography. He had been charged with 10 counts, but the prosecutors have since abandoned one count. If convicted, Edgington, who is eligible for probation, faces up to 10 years in prison on each count.

He and Sutton are relying on a statutory defense that says, in part, that possession of child pornography is not illegal if it was for a “bona fide educational, medical, psychological, psychiatric, judicial, law enforcement or legislative purpose.”

Edgington said his fight against child pornography began in summer 2006 when he read an article about a group in Florida that pushed for stricter laws targeting Web sites that exploit children. He said he told church members about his crusade, which Sam Armstrong, senior preacher at Elm Mott Church of Christ, confirmed in defense testimony Tuesday.

Edgington told jurors that his plan was to investigate Web sites that feature children and to print out examples of so-called child face models, ones depicted in provocative, adult poses but scantily clothed, ones featuring nude photos of children and ones depicting children in sex acts.

Along with the photos, Waco police confiscated the newspaper article from Florida printed out with Chet Edwards’ name, address and Web site written on it. While evidence shows that the article was printed out many months after some of the pornographic photos were printed, Edgington explained that he lost his first copy of the article and printed out another one later.

Waco Police Detective Scott Holt, who led the investigation, said investigators also found at least three e-mail messages from Edgington to young girls depicted on some of the Web sites, including one that said: “You are so beautiful. It makes me smile to see your face.”

Edgington said he only sent that to be “sneaky” so they would send him more photos as part of his crusade. He also said that more than 100 images police found in the black box of Emma Watson, the young actress from the Harry Potter movies, were a collection he was saving for his young granddaughter. He said they were already in the box before he put a lock on it when he started his project, despite what prosecutors noted were uncanny similarities in appearance among Watson and the young girls in the photos.

Vicha asked Edgington during cross-examination why he merely didn’t ask trained police investigators to help with his quest and why it took him so long — more than 10 months — to collect his evidence, which he never did take to the congressman.

“During the 10 months you are trying to complete your operation, who was helping those exploited little girls?” Vicha said, wondering why Edgington hadn’t printed out pictures of exploited young boys as part of his mission.

“I started working on behalf of children and others 40 years ago, and I have no intention of stopping until the day I die,” Edgington said.