Current:Home > BackEx-North Dakota lawmaker charged with traveling to Czech Republic for sex with minor-LoTradeCoin
Ex-North Dakota lawmaker charged with traveling to Czech Republic for sex with minor
View Date:2024-12-23 21:02:16
A retired state senator from North Dakota has been charged with traveling to Europe and paying to have sex with a minor and with receiving images depicting child abuse, according to a federal indictment.
Longtime state Sen. Ray Holmberg, 79, was arrested Monday and released after pleading not guilty to one count of travel with intent to engage in illicit sexual activity and one count of receipt of child pornography in the U.S. District Court in Fargo. His trial is set for Dec. 5.
Prosecutors said Holmberg repeatedly traveled to Prague in the Czech Republic from June 2011 to November 2016 for the purpose of having sex with a minor.
Holmberg served more than 45 years in the North Dakota Senate until he resigned last year after The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead revealed he exchanged dozens of text messages with a person who was jailed on charges related to child sexual abuse images. The indictment adds that Holmberg used aliases and received and attempted to receive images of child sexual abuse between Nov. 2012 and Mach 4 2013.
In November 2021, law enforcement searched his Grand Forks home, seizing video discs and additional items.
Holmberg’s attorney, Mark Friese, said authorities investigated Holmberg "for two years or more and allege nothing recent. The conduct they allege is from more than a decade ago."
Holmberg was released with conditions, and the judge did not require the posting of any bond, Friese said.
'Only the negative things will be remembered'
Holmberg chaired the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee, which writes budgets. In March 2022, he announced he wouldn’t seek reelection. He resigned in April 2022, stating that "recent news stories have become a distraction,” according to The Forum.
If Holmberg is convicted, his decades serving the public "will be forgotten about, and only the negative things will be remembered," said former North Dakota Senate Majority Leader Rich Wardner, who served with Holmberg for nearly 25 years.
Holmberg was reimbursed roughly $126,000 for nearly 70 out-of-state trips from 2013 through mid-April 2022 to places that included four dozen U.S. cities, Canada, Puerto Rico, and several European countries, according to an AP review of his travel records.
The indictment comes after Nicholas James Morgan-Derosier pleaded guilty last month in federal court to six counts of possessing images depicting child sexual abuse and one count of receiving and distributing such images.
Morgan-Derosier was the person texting with Holmberg from jail, according to The Forum.
Contributing: The Associated Press
veryGood! (1333)
Related
- AIT Community Introduce
- FBI is investigating alleged abuse in Baton Rouge police warehouse known as the ‘Brave Cave’
- Biden administration to ban medical debt from Americans' credit scores
- $70M Powerball winner, who was forced to reveal her identity, is now a fierce advocate for anonymity
- Missing Ole Miss student declared legally dead as trial for man accused in his death looms
- Josh Duhamel Reveals Son Axl's Emotional Reaction to His Pregnancy With Audra Mari
- Biden administration offers legal status to Venezuelans: 5 Things podcast
- 'Dangerous' convicted child sex offender who escaped Missouri hospital captured by authorities
- UConn, Kansas State among five women's college basketball games to watch this weekend
- 5 ways Deion Sanders' Colorado team can shock Oregon and move to 4-0
Ranking
- Whoopi Goldberg Shares Very Relatable Reason She's Remained on The View
- Australia’s government posts $14.2 billion budget surplus after 15 years in the red
- Prince William's Earthshot Prize announces finalists for 2023 awards
- Polly Klaas' murder 30 years later: Investigators remember dogged work to crack case
- What is best start in NBA history? Five teams ahead of Cavaliers' 13-0 record
- Former Italian President Giorgio Napolitano dies at 98
- Are paper wine bottles the future? These companies think so.
- A Taylor Swift Instagram post helped drive a surge in voter registration
Recommendation
-
American Idol’s Triston Harper, 16, Expecting a Baby With Wife Paris Reed
-
Lawn mowers and equipment valued at $100,000 stolen from parking lot at Soldier Field
-
AP Week in Pictures: North America | September 15-21, 2023
-
NAACP signs agreement with FEMA to advance equity in disaster resilience
-
Auburn surges, while Kansas remains No. 1 in the USA TODAY Sports men's basketball poll
-
*NSYNC's Justin Timberlake Reveals the Real Reason He Sang It's Gonna Be May
-
Ceasefire appears to avert war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, but what's the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute about?
-
Zelenskyy visiting Canada for first time since war started seeking to shore up support for Ukraine