LOUISA, Va. (AP) - A Virginia man has been sentenced to five life terms in prison for raping a child and producing child pornography.
Raymond W. Harry Jr., 35, also was sentenced Wednesday to an additional mandatory 100 years in prison.
The investigation into Harry was launched in October 2018 after he was stopped by a state trooper and charged with transporting methamphetamine into the state for distribution. He called his sister from jail and asked her to go to his recreational vehicle and delete everything on his cellphones and email accounts, prosecutors said. The sister reported finding photos and videos of Harry abusing a child he’d come in contact with two years earlier in Spotsylvania County after being released from prison for a violent felony, authorities said. By the time the sister told her and Harry’s father, who then told police, Harry had already posted bail on the drug charge and been released from custody. He also had moved his RV into Louisa County.
Over a month later, authorities searched Harry’s RV and walked into “a den of hell,” according to a statement by the office of Louisa County Commonwealth’s Attorney Rusty McGuire. Not only did they rescue the child and arrest Harry, they also found drugs and guns, as well as digital media storage devices filled with videos and photos and rape and sexual abuse, it says. Evidence showed that Harry would drug the child with meth and other chemicals prior to the rapes.
“The evidence revealed that his RV and places he stayed were his dungeons of abuse,” the statement says. “He set up cameras, produced, directed, and carried out violent rape and sexual abuse of the child. The videos and photos documented his crimes and his almost head-to-toe tattoos identified him in the photos and videos.”
The Louisa County case was scheduled to go to trial, but Harry avoided it by pleading guilty. His connection to the child remains unclear. He still has two child pornography charges pending in Spotsylvania County. A trial in that case has been set for January.
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