Republican South Carolina Representative, RJ May III, Takes Plea Deal For Distribution Of Childhood Sex Abuse Material
The GOP fixture preached against the harms of gender-affirming care, now found to have hoarded over 200 videos of adults engaging sexually with toddlers and children.
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Trigger warning: content discusses childhood sexual abuse and imagery
On Monday, RJ May III, 38, the former South Carolina Representative, pleaded guilty to five counts of possessing and distributing child sexual abuse material. According to a local ABC affiliate, U.S. Attorney Bryan Stirling told media after Monday’s hearing, “These actions of Richard John May are deplorable, depraved, and disgusting.” May, acting as his own attorney, decided to accept the deal after prosecutors laid out how they planned to move forward with evidence at the trial, which was scheduled for October.
As GO reported in August, the Anti-LGBTQ SC lawmaker had been facing 10 Counts of Distributing Child Sexual Abuse Material, and had only recently given up his seat in the House. Since his arrest on June 11th following a long investigation, May had been locked up in the Edgefield County jail awaiting trial. With young children at home, about the same age as those he’s now admitted to exploiting, the prosecutors’ request that bail be denied has proven judicious.
The videos show adults engaging in sex acts with toddlers and children, using sex devices on children, and one clip involved bestiality.
A fixture of GOP politics in South Carolina, the heinous nature of May’s actions is all the more egregious given the hypocrisy evident since the start of these proceedings: he was a founding member of ultra-conservative South Carolina Freedom Caucus, and presented himself as a righteous crusader. “We as legislators have an obligation to ensure that our children have no harm done to them,” May said on the statehouse floor earlier this year regarding gender-affirming care for minors.
The case against May gained traction when federal investigators began tracking him after the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children got a cyber-tip and was contacted by the messaging app Kik. Kik had flagged videos depicting child sexual abuse from the username “joebidennnn69.” In a hearing last June, prosecutors said that 220 videos and images of toddlers and young children had been saved onto that account. Reports indicate that he distributed the files 470 times in just five days.
According to The Guardian, prosecutors linked May to uploading and downloading child sexual abuse videos “by showing he multitasked, emailing work files, making phone calls, and performing web searches as part of his job as a political consultant, as he was on Kik asking for ‘Bad moms. Bad dads. Bad pre teens.'”
With the plea deal, prosecutors agreed to drop five of the ten counts, and May gave up his right to a jury trial. The disgraced lawmaker’s sentencing is scheduled for January 14th at 10 a.m. May faces up to 20 years in prison for each count.
If you or someone you know is the victim of child abuse, call or text the Childhelp abuse hotline at 800-422-4453 or visit their website for resources and to report child abuse or DM for help.
