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DA: Cadet traded videos showing boys forced into sex
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WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. (AP) — A cadet in his last year at West Point collected and traded photos and videos of boys being forced into sexual acts, a federal prosecutor said Tuesday.In opening statements at the trial of Ricky Patrick Hester, Assistant U.S. Attorney Lauren Schorr warned jurors that the evidence is disturbing and graphic, “but in order to understand what is going on here, you need to see it.”Hester, 25, of Granger, Indiana, has pleaded not guilty to charges of possessing and distributing child pornography. If convicted of distribution, he would face five to 20 years in prison and could be further disciplined by West Point.Tall and lanky, he wore his hair Army short in court.Schorr said Hester “confessed in full” the day he was arrested at his barracks on the West Point campus. But his lawyer, Patrick Mullin, said the government’s questioning and its search of Hester’s room were improper.