'Abominable' Montana Man Sentenced to 27 Years in Prison for Trying to Sexually Enslave Young Girls
Gary Lee Hodges, 72, wanted to sexually enslave two children and become their "papaw," federal prosecutors said.
A 72-year-old Montana man has been sentenced to nearly three decades in prison for trying to make sexual slaves out of two young girls he approached on the internet, prosecutors said.
Gary Lee Hodges was given a 27-year sentence after pleading guilty to two counts of attempted enticement of a minor to engage in illegal sexual activity, federal prosecutors announced. In court, his conduct was called "abominable" and “extraordinarily disturbing.”
According to a probable cause affidavit filed by a FBI special agent, Hodges was using a sex website and thought he was communicating with the West Virginia mother of two girls, ages 11 and 13.
But the man was really conversing with an undercover agent, the affidavit said. Hodges said he wanted to be the "patriarch" of an "incest family" and expressed interest in having sex with the woman's children, authorities said.
The woman said that could happen, and from December 2021 to January 2022, Hodges sent messages to the woman and to what he believed were the young girls, authorities said. The messages were explicitly sexual and included descriptions of how he wanted one of the girls to dress, the affidavit said. They also contained the types of sexual intercourse he wanted to have with the mother and the girls, authorities said.
Hodges was arrested in January 2022 after he flew to West Virginia to meet what he thought was his new family, authorities said. He pleaded guilty in June.
His sentencing was last week, federal prosecutors announced. Along with 27 years in prison, Hodges was also sentenced to 15 years of supervised release and must register as a sex offender.
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