SEATTLE — When he was caught in 2015 with hundreds of images on his cellphone of children being sexually abused and assaulted, longtime sex offender Raymond Devore told police they’d never grasp his compulsion.
“You don’t understand,” he said.
On Thursday, the former Arlington man, 44, was sentenced to 35 years in federal prison.
It was the mandatory minimum punishment for somebody with his history of multiple convictions for crimes relating to sexual exploitation of children.
Devore had been living at an Arlington halfway house when he was arrested for exchanging sexually explicit texts and pictures with a 15-year-old Oregon girl. People at the girl’s school were worried when they learned she planned on visiting an older man named “Ray” in Seattle.
The cache of disturbing photos and video was found when Devore’s phone was searched.
“Even by the standards of child pornography, Devore’s collection was particularly horrific,” assistant U.S. attorney Michael Dion said in a sentencing memo. “Devore had deliberately amassed a collection showing the abuse, rape and sadistic torture of very young children and infants.”
The search also turned up chat messages that he’d sent 87 different people who presented themselves online as being under 18. Printouts of those chats filled 400 pages, federal prosecutors noted.
Although he fought the allegations — even pleading guilty at one point, then seeking the court’s permission to reverse course — Devore ultimately was convicted of possession, receipt and distribution of child pornography, attempted production of child pornography and attempted enticement of a minor.
U.S. District Judge Thomas Zilly called Devore “a predator, obsessed with connecting with young teens,” according to a Justice Department news release.
Devore was convicted in 2003 of possessing child pornography and communicating with a minor for immoral purposes. The cases involved young people in Snohomish County. He had subsequent convictions for repeated failure to register as a sex offender.
The case that brought him the 35-year sentence was investigated by state corrections officials, Arlington police, the Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office, the U.S. Secret Service and police in McMinnville, Oregon.
Charges initially were filed in Snohomish County Superior Court but were prosecuted federally.
Scott North: 425-339-3431; north@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @snorthnews.
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