Michael Christopher Hardy, who was arrested in September 2012 on allegations that he drove to Catoosa County to have sex with a teenager, pleaded guilty in Superior Court this afternoon.
Hardy pleaded guilty to two counts of computer pornography, while the district attorney's office agreed not to prosecute him on four counts of criminal attempt to commit a felony, said Hardy's lawyer, McCracken Poston. While each computer charge carries a sentence of up to 20 years in prison, Hardy will spend all 20 years on probation.
In all, Poston said Hardy faced up to 120 years in prison. He said his client suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from his time in the military, in which he was tasked with picking up soldiers' bodies.
"He was like a zombie then and could have been coaxed into agreeing to anything," Poston said in a statement. "He served our country with honor, and he suffered greatly from recovering the bodies of his colleagues while under fire."
Members of an FBI Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force arrested Hardy after someone chatted with him undercover, pretending to set him up with a teenager whom he could have sex with. The operation involved officers posting ads on websites like Craigslist.
Soon after Hardy's arrest, however, Poston learned that the head of the task force, FBI Special Agent Ken Hillman, allowed a woman he was having an affair with to participate in the investigations. Hillman met the woman, Angela Russell, after her then-husband, Emerson Russell, let the task force use property he owned to run their operations.
Angela Russell is not a trained law enforcement officer. After her involvement became public, the FBI suspended Hillman, and the task force disbanded. Hillman pleaded guilty to a charge of disclosure of confidential information in U.S. District Court last year and received a sentence of six months probation.
Poston said Hardy's case was "ground zero" for the Angela Russell scandal. He said she was the one to chat with his client and searched his car after his arrest.
Two more cases are still pending from the task force: Auner Landaverde and Brad Lee Jones are scheduled to go to trial Dec. 3.
Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit District Attorney Herbert "Buzz" Franklin contacted the U.S. Attorney's Office on Oct. 17, asking for Hillman to testify in the upcoming trials. Assistant U.S. Attorney Darcy Coty responded in a letter, telling Franklin that Hillman could take the stand. But he can only speak about the specific events that led to the defendants' arrests.
"Hillman is not authorized to provide testimony about any legally privileged or classified information, FBI training, FBI investigative techniques, or any pending or past FBI investigations, or any privledged or sensitive law-enforcement information," Coty wrote. "In sum, Hillman is not authorized to testify about any matter for which he has not received express authorization."
Coty said she will attend the trials to make sure Hillman does not speak about anything the department has not given him approval to talk about.
Contact staff writer Tyler Jett at 423-757-6476 or tjett@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @LetsJett.