KANSAS CITY (MO)
Reuters
By Carey Gillam
KANSAS CITY, Missouri | Thu Sep 12, 2013
(Reuters) – A Kansas City Catholic priest was sentenced to 50 years in prison on Thursday on federal child pornography charges for taking sexually explicit photos of several young girls, including a 2-year-old.
Shawn Ratigan, 47, pleaded guilty in August 2012 to four counts of producing child pornography and one count of attempting to produce child pornography.
“Society needs to be protected from you,” U.S. District Judge Gary Fenner told Ratigan before he pronounced the sentence. “You did this to yourself.”
Prosecutors had sought the 50-year sentence, which they had said would amount to a life term, after it was discovered that he had taken hundreds of lewd photographs of young girls.
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