Ogden man pleads guilty to abuse
Tues, Feb 1, 2005 Larger Text Smaller Text
By TIM GURRISTER
Standard-Examiner staff
tgurrister(a)standard.net
OGDEN -- In tears, serial pedophile Walter Lee Hunt pleaded guilty Monday to
four first-degree felonies and two second-degree felonies for plying 11- and
12-year-old girls with drugs and alcohol in return for sex.
The rapes occurred over two years in the late 1990s in Ogden, according to
charging documents, leading to 14 counts ranging from aggravated sexual
abuse of a child and object rape of a child to sexual exploitation of a
minor.
The two Ogden victims, now over 18, went to police after the 60-year-old
Hunt called them and proposed marriage, something they had talked about
years earlier.
Eight counts were dismissed in a plea bargain. Second District Judge John R.
Morris set sentencing for April 4.
Two of the counts Hunt pleaded to related to filming his victims, which
became key to the plea bargain as prosecutors sought a cache of videos and
photographs his victims said he took of them.
Weber County Attorney Mark DeCaria said defense attorney John Caine "went
the extra mile on this one. He actually went to a home of Hunt's relative in
Malad, Idaho, to be sure any film was secured." Hunt was arrested at the
home.
Caine was able to report to the court that all the film material there was
in the possession of the Oneida County Sheriff's Office and scheduled to be
destroyed.
A large amount of other filmed material was believed destroyed years ago by
a concerned relative, DeCaria said.
DeCaria and Caine both believe all and any film Hunt made of victims is now
"out of circulation in the stream of commerce," which DeCaria said was a
concern to the Ogden victims who worried about their pictures turning up on
the Internet.
"We have no evidence of that," he said. But he also conceded that given "the
huge sea of crud that is child pornography online" there is no way to be 100
percent sure.
When Hunt was arrested in November, police feared there might have been
numerous other young victims across the West where Hunt has lived the last
10 years. He has had 12 different addresses in that time, chiefly in Utah,
Idaho and Nevada, and has a wife in Mexico.
But no other victims came forward, and no additional charges were filed.
Hunt has been held in the Weber County Jail without bail and faces the
likelihood of finishing his natural life in the Utah State Prison.
