Colfax man gets more than 24 years in federal prison for child sexual exploitation
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Judge sentenced Paul Hughes to 24 years and four months in federal prison.
- Hughes produced explicit videos, collected 3,000+ illegal images and recordings.
- Placer County Sheriff’s Office helped FBI with its investigation into Hughes.
A judge on Thursday sentenced a Placer County man to 24 years and four months in federal prison for sexual exploitation of a child and collecting more than 3,000 images of child pornography.
Paul Hughes, 42, of Colfax, pleaded guilty to the child sexual exploitation charge on Sept. 12, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Sacramento.
Federal prosecutors said Hughes created visual depictions of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct on three occasions, from September 2018 through June 2019, using his cellphone to record at least three videos containing child sexual abuse material and saved the videos on an external hard drive.
“This defendant preyed on the most innocent and vulnerable members of our society — children,” Acting U.S. Attorney Michele Beckwith said in a news release.
Along with the illicit videos he created, investigators recovered more than 3,000 images and videos of child sexual abuse material on Hughes’ external hard drive and Google account, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Investigators also found on Hughes’ digital devices hundreds of videos and photographs of females from the ages of 5 to 55 in various public places in Colfax. Prosecutors said Hughes recorded those videos and taken those photos while angling the camera toward their groins.
“Paul Hughes exploited children, forever damaging the memories of their childhood,” FBI Sacramento Special Agent in Charge Sid Patel said in the news release.
The criminal case against Hughes was the result of an investigation by the FBI with help from the Placer County Sheriff’s Office. Assistant U.S. Attorney Denise N. Yasinow prosecuted Hughes.
