A Catoosa County man has been sentenced to serve 100 years in prison for child molestation and pornography.
Brandon Bennet, 39, was sentenced by Judge Brian House after his conviction by a Catoosa County jury.
He was found guilty of 15 counts of child sex offenses after an earlier two-day trial before Judge House.
Bennet was convicted of two counts of aggravated child molestation, one count of incest, three counts of child molestation, six counts of sexual exploitation of children, two counts of computer pornography, and one count of invasion of privacy after less than 15 minutes of deliberations by the jury.
Evidence presented at trial showed that Bennet moved to Catoosa County in 2021 at the request of his sister, who was suffering from terminal cancer.
In February 2022, a child confided to a family friend that Bennet had molested him while he was sleeping and repeatedly solicited sexual acts from the child. Further, Bennet had been soliciting sex from some of the child’s friends.
Following an investigation by the Fort Oglethorpe Police Department, Bennet and the child victim’s cell phones were seized and examined with the assistance of the Georgia Bureau of Investigations. Located on the child’s phone were text messages sent from Bennet bragging about the sexual abuse he had already done to the child as well as soliciting additional sexual acts from the child. Some of these messages included Bennet attempting to blackmail the child with food and privileges in exchange for sex.
On Bennet’s phone, law enforcement located several videos of Bennet molesting the child and filming the child while he was in the bathroom. Additionally, a plethora of other child pornography was located on Bennet’s phone, some of which featuring infants being molested by adults.
At the trial, all of the electronic evidence was presented to the jury as well as the testimonies of several witnesses including the child and one of the child’s friends whom Bennet was soliciting for sex but never molested.
The case was presented to the jury by Assistant District Attorney David Wolfe, who spent nearly two years preparing the case for trial with the assistance of Victim Advocate Ashely Nicholson who spent countless hours communicating with the victims and their families as well as coordinating all of the witnesses in the case.
Former Fort Oglethorpe PD Detective Tammy Davis was the lead investigator in the case and testified along with other members of local and state law enforcement as well as Holly Kittle, senior forensic interviewer from the Children’s Advocacy Center in Fort Oglethorpe.
The jury found Bennet guilty of all 15 counts. Immediately after the verdict, Judge House sentenced Bennet to life with the first 100 years to be served in prison.