Former Illinois state trooper Juan Rodriguez was sentenced to 60 days in jail and 30 months' probation for viewing child pornography while on duty.
Though he faced up to five years in prison, according to the Chicago Sun-Times, he was able to reduce that sentence with a guilty plea. In addition to the jail term, Rodriguez will have to pay $2,000 in fines and register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.
NBC Chicago reports that between good-time credit and time already served, Rodriguez will likely be free within four weeks.
At the time of his guilty plea, Rodriguez, a 27-year veteran who had retired by the time charges were filed, told authorities that he originally began browsing child pornography because he was "bored." He would visit the sites while on duty patrolling the highways and tollways of northern Illinois for District 15 of the state police.
The Chicago Tribune writes that his name was first connected to child pornography in a 2003 investigation. Then in 2008, another federal investigation showed that he used his state-issued laptop to pay $99 for a subscription to a child porn website.
Rodriguez's isn't the only high-profile child pornography case that's surfaced in the Chicago area recently, as the Sun-Times points out in a separate story:
In one such case, a Bartlett man was sentenced by a federal judge in Chicago last month to serve 40 years in prison for streaming video on the Internet that showed him sexually molesting an infant. Brian Annoreno, 35, broadcast the attacks in a private online chat room, authorities said.
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In April, a former ice-skating coach from Mundelein, Edward Bernas, 63, was sentenced to 14 years in federal prison for possessing child porn. In October, the former choir director at a Glen Ellyn church, Brian Milnikel, 45, of Naperville, was sentenced to six months for possessing child porn. In February, former Columbia College Professor Kevin Fuller, 43, a one-time Oak Park resident, was sentenced to six years for possessing what a prosecutor called “some of the worst images we’ve ever seen.”
The Attorney General's office and state's attorneys across Illinois are stepping up their efforts to prosecute these crimes, according to the report.
