Mississippi mom filmed sex assault of a 3-year-old to send to a lover on Facebook, FBI says
Editor’s note: This story contains instances of sexual assault against children. Viewer discretion is advised. If a child you know is a victim of abuse, call the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children’s CyberTipline at 800-843-5678.
“Don’t be mad at me,” a Mississippi Coast mother mouthed to a relative, tears streaming down her face as she was led from a federal courtroom to jail on federal charges of sexually assaulting a 3-year-old child.
‘How can I not be?” the relative said in a hallway after Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrea Jones successfully pleaded with a judge to keep Sarah Jane Bennett jailed pending trial for allegedly sexually assaulting the child on multiple occasions, filming the acts, and distributing them over the internet.
Bennett allegedly committed the crimes after she started chatting online with a man who wanted her and the child to have sex with him and other children, FBI Special Agent Hillary Ladner said during testimony Tuesday. The alleged crimes occurred over at least a three-month period ending in December.
Bennett’s attorney, public defender Leilani Tynes, argued that Bennett should be eligible for home confinement with electronic monitoring pending trial, telling the judge the Pass Christian woman is undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer and is expected to undergo surgery soon.
Tynes told the judge the Harrison County jail wouldn’t give Bennett pain medication, and she could not get the type of treatment she needed in jail.
But Jones questioned an FBI agent who detailed the allegations against Bennett and felt she could be a threat to the safety of minors in the community if released.
Judge Bradley Rath agreed Bennett should be held without bond, noting that even if Bennett was placed on home confinement with electronic monitoring, she could be a threat to the community and others.
The federal grand jury indicted Bennett on four counts of production of images of minors engaged in sex acts and one count each of possession of any image of a minor engaged in sexually explicit acts and distribution of images of minors engaged in sexually explicit acts.
Online chats and sex crimes
The federal agent outlined the allegations against Bennett during her testimony.
Bennett, she said, started committing crimes against the girl after the two started talking about what kind of sex they wanted to have, including sex with children.
The man allegedly told Bennett he wanted videos and images of her having sex with the child.
Bennett and the man often expressed their love for one another in their conversations and talked about meeting up at her home so they could have sex together and with the child, Ladner testified.
The man never made it to Bennett’s home before his arrest.
Child pornography investigators first found the videos and images of the sexual assaults in the videos and pictures that Bennett sent to the man’s Facebook Messenger account.
When authorities interviewed the man, he identified Bennett as the abuser.
Child endures sex abuse on video
When agents went to Bennett’s dilapidated mobile home in Pass Christian, they found the child pornography Bennett had tried to delete from her Samsung Galaxy phone, according to court testimony.
Bennett at first denied any wrongdoing, the agent said, but later admitted to the crimes after agents told Bennett the tattoos on her arms matched those of the offender in the videos.
Ladner described what the child had endured in detail while Bennett put her head in her hands and cried. Before the agent finished her testimony, Bennett threw up in a garbage can next to the defense table.
The agent described the videos and images in graphic detail.
In one video, the agent said Bennett forces the 3-year-old to perform oral sex on Bennett. In another, Bennett allegedly forcefully rubs the child’s private parts in an attempt to arouse her. Another video, the agent said, shows Bennett spanking the 3-year-old as she cries out in pain.
