FARMINGTON -- A former South Davis Metro Fire Agency captain blames his addiction to pornography for his actions that have sent him to prison.
"Quite honestly, your honor, (pornography) destroyed my soul," Bradley Dean Freeze, 43, said before he was sentenced Thursday in 2nd District Court.
Judge Thomas L. Kay sentenced Freeze, of Kaysville, to serve 15 years to life in Utah State Prison. Freeze pleaded guilty in December to one count of aggravated sexual abuse of a child, which carries a mandatory sentence of 15 years to life.
Freeze's attorney, Greg Skordas, said Freeze took full responsibility for what happened and understands "it's unforgiveable."
According to court documents, a girl, who is younger than 14, told her mother that Freeze had touched her inappropriately and took photos of her with his cellphone between Sept. 1, 2010, and Aug. 3, 2011.
He also had the girl touch him inappropriately, court documents state.
The girl's grandparents spoke at the hearing.
"We trusted him," the grandmother said. "We more than trusted him. He became our best friend. We could not understand or believe this. This was a destruction of a family."
Freeze was originally charged with three first-degree felony counts of aggravated sexual abuse of a child and two second-degree felony charges of sexual exploitation of a minor. In exchange for the guilty plea, prosecutors dismissed two first-degree felony charges and the two second-degree felony charges.
Kay could have sentenced Freeze to six years to life or 10 years to life at the prison, but only if he put on record the justification for doing so. The judge said he could not justify a lesser sentence for Freeze.
Kay also said the pre-sentence report indicated that Freeze had been sexually abused as a child.
Kay said since he became a judge in 1998, the number of sex crimes, especially against children, has increased dramatically.
"On a court calendar with 40 to 50 cases, I would have had one sexual crime. But now, it's 40 to 50 cases on the calendar and 10 or 12 of those are sex crimes," Kay said during the hearing.
Every defendant sentenced in a sex crime case said it started with pornography, the judge said.
"Pornography is as addictive, if not more, than drugs," Kay said.
Kay said it was legislators who decided protecting children was important enough to make the prison sentences mandatory.
"These are the most serious cases and in many instances, the sentences are longer than murder cases," Kay said.
Freeze had been with the fire department for at least 15 years before he resigned in September 2011 after he was arrested.
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