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Former Ozarks YMCA employee sentenced to 10 years for child porn

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A former Ozarks Regional YMCA employee was sentenced in federal court yesterday to serve 10 years in prison without parole for receiving and distributing child pornography.

Benjamin Goodwin, who worked at the YMCA for more than a decade, also was ordered to undergo 10 years of supervised release after his incarceration is complete, according to a news release from the office of Timothy Garrison, U.S. attorney for the Western District of Missouri.

Goodwin worked part time in the school-age services department of the YMCA at the time of the offense, according to past Springfield Business Journal reporting. He admitted to receiving and distributing child porn online between June 2016 and August 2017.

Court documents indicate administrators of the messaging service Chatstep submitted a tip that Goodwin posted images depicting child pornography, according to the release.

Goodwin, who also was a special education paraprofessional prior to his arrest, admitted to investigators that he sent and received 25 images depicting child porn with another person. During an exchange with another undisclosed individual, Goodwin transmitted a picture of one of the children he supervised at the YMCA, according to a forensic examination of his cellphone and iPad.

Investigators also found dozens of photos of children taken at the YMCA and other venues, according to the release.

In a statement issued last August after Goodwin was indicted, Ozarks Regional YMCA CEO Steve Gimenez said the offenses did not occur at the YMCA or within its programs.

YMCA officials could not be reached for comment this morning by deadline.

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