An Osceola man is alleged to have drugged 23 children, molested them, and taken pornographic photographs of them and posted them on the Internet.
All the children were under 12 when they were exploited, according to court records. Photos of them in sexual positions showed up on the Internet along with photos of Edgington abusing them, one parent said.
"You know how they say a picture is worth a thousand words?" said Brian West of Des Moines. At the moment he was shown one of those photos of his daughter, "I couldn't think of one. It's a picture that never goes away," West said.
Edgington's house is on a corner lot, about three blocks from the Amtrak station in Osceola. Freight trains scream by at the end of the street and conversations stop when the train whistles blow.
"He was charged with what?" said Kelly Beminio, who lives just down the block and around the corner from the Edgington house. "You're kidding me. I hadn't heard anything about it."
Edgington pleaded guilty to child pornography charges Sept. 6 in federal court in Des Moines and will be sentenced in May. The agreement calls for a minimum sentence of 15 years in prison and a maximum of 30 years.
Authorities seized computer-related materials and a camera from Edgington's home in May 2006 after first busting a computer user in Fresno, Calif., and tracing a photo of one of West's children back to Edgington in Osceola.
The prosecution prompted a couple of small news items in The Des Moines Register and a short report on a TV Web site, but the full story may yet have to come out, either in court records or media reports. And some parents believe justice has not been done.
Brian West and his wife are outraged at Edgington, but they're also furious with former Clarke County Attorney Elizabeth Reynoldson, who declined to prosecute Edgington for child molestation.
West said that even if Edgington is sentenced to the maximum, he could be out in 26 1/2 years. "He could be out at age 64," he said. "Plenty of time to cause more pain."
Reynoldson said she cannot comment on a pending case. The current Clarke County attorney, Ronald Wheeler, said a plea deal was arranged before he took office, so he declined to comment, too.
He said he was told that sexual abuse charges involving the children could not be filed in Clarke County because that would constitute double jeopardy.
Also, West said, he was told that county officials did not want be responsible for hindering the federal case. He said he doesn't believe either of those arguments.
Court records say that he "performed a sex act by force or against the will of the other participant who was under the influence of a drug inducing sleep or was otherwise in a state of unconsciousness, rendering herself physically helpless."
In each of the adult cases, the story was the same: On three separate dates, Edgington allegedly performed sex acts on women who were helpless to stop him. He pleaded guilty of the charges.
The sentences in those cases - also to be handed down in May - are to run concurrently with the federal sentence, West said. "So that's no sentence at all," he said.
Federal court documents do not allege that Edgington was drugging or giving alcohol to children, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Patrick O'Meara would not talk about specifics until the case is resolved.
The couple said they learned from their children that Edgington woke them in the middle of the night and told them to take "kiddie vitamins and eat chocolate-covered cherries."
Like him, the parents of some other victims knew Edgington and trusted him, West said. He said Edgington often volunteered to take care of their children overnight or for a weekend.
"We heard from friends, who would tell us, 'My God, now we're a part of this, too.' Some of them couldn't even remember a time when their kids had ever been alone with him."
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