Crime & Safety
Frankfort Township Man Gets 10 Years for Trying to Buy Sex with Minors
With good behavior and credit for time already served, Brandon Bergthold, 25, could be out in less than five years as part of a plea deal. Bergthold was arrested in a sting operation in January at a New Lenox motel.
Brandon Bergthold spoke with a sense of stoicism at odds with the red jumpsuit he will have to wear everyday.
As part of a plea deal, the 25-year-old Frankfort Township man was sentenced Tuesday to 10 years in the Illinois Department of Corrections, less than half of which he’ll serve with good behavior and credit for the days already spent in jail awaiting trial.
READ:
Find out what's happening in Frankfortwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
He was arrested on Jan. 26 at a New Lenox motel where he intended .
Instead he met detectives from both Will and Cook counties who had been investigating him since he posted an ad on Craigslist. Email correspondence between Bergthold and a detective under the pseudonym Paul Pedorski had been ensuing for months before Bergthold pushed for a meeting.
Find out what's happening in Frankfortwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
“He made a full confession,” assistant state’s attorney Daniel Walsh said Tuesday.
Three of the four charges related to indecent solicitation and traveling to meet a minor were dropped in the plea agreement.
READ:
After dispensing with formalities, Judge Amy Bertani-Tomczak asked Bergthold if he had anything to say. The normal clatter of paperwork stood still. Attorneys, jailers, prisoners, clerks—the entire courtroom—seemed to stop and listen. Bergthold, who had previously been so full of resolve, hesitated.
Several seconds of silence hung, and then quietly he said, “No, your honor.”
Had Bergthold been convicted at trial, he would have faced four to 15 years in prison. Had he refused to take the plea, prosecutors were planning to bring more charges against him for the child pornography they apparently found on his home computer.
Walsh noted that the felony charges in this case carried overlapping sentences, so that “if we brought additional charges, it wouldn’t have mattered.”
NEWSLETTER: Subscribe for Headlines and Breaking News Delivered to Your Inbox
After prison, Bergthold will face two years of probation. He also was ordered to pay $863 in court costs and must register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.
When it was all over, Marie Taraska, his attorney, walked with him to his seat and put a hand on his shoulder. She mouthed, “You’ll be OK.” He dropped his head and did not raise it until three of his supporters had left the courtroom.
