Zimmerman pleads no contest to child porn charges

Former fire inspector John Craig Zimmerman on Monday pleaded no contest before a U.S. district judge to four separate counts of production, promotion, receipt and possession of child pornography.

During the daylong trial by judge, a 22-year-old woman, testified that several years ago Zimmerman, 52, took a picture with her when she was between the ages of 14 and 16 before she left the state to live elsewhere.

It is The Herald’s policy not to identify potential victims of sexual crimes.

The woman told the court Zimmerman never took pictures of her naked.

“I only took one picture with him,” she said. “To my knowledge, that was the only one I ever took.”

During the course of the investigation Immigration and Customs Enforcement Special Agents Juan Avalos and Maria Gilbert found compact discs at Zimmerman’s Los Fresnos home containing pictures with the woman’s face superimposed on other naked bodies in explicit sexual positions.

The U.S. Attorney’s office argued throughout Monday’s trial that Zimmerman cropped her face and imposed it onto other images and backgrounds.

Zimmerman’s lead attorney, Joe Hernandez, said his client decided to enter the no-contest plea before U.S. District Judge Andrew S. Hanen after the judge ruled against a motion to suppress evidence earlier this year, and after a second witness was about to take the stand against him at Monday’s trial.

Hernandez, who argues that evidence was wrongfully collected from Zimmerman’s work and home computers, said he would appeal Hanen’s sentencing to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

“We are looking at the issues,” he said shortly after Zimmerman’s plea. “We feel that hopefully the appeals court will side with Mr. Zimmerman.”

Texas Rangers and Brownsville police detectives on March 9 arrested Zimmerman in San Benito on a warrant for possession of child pornography, according to court records. He is being held at a Cameron County jail.

City Manager Charlie Cabler placed him on leave with pay Feb. 7 after allegations surfaced that he misused city property. At that time, Cabler would not say what the city property was or the nature of the misuse.

According to court documents, an employee at the fire department told Fire Chief Lenny Perez that an unknown man left a voice mail the weekend of Feb. 2 alleging Zimmerman was a pedophile.

A search of Zimmerman’s external hard drive on his work computer yielded pictures of naked young girls exposing themselves.

Avalos and Gilbert searched Zimmerman’s Los Fresnos home on Feb. 9 and found hundreds of images and videos of naked children stored on CDs in various rooms at the home.

Gilbert later identified two girls and a boy who appeared in the images and interviewed them.

Zimmerman was subsequently indicted on 12 counts of possession and production of child pornography by a state grand jury. Those charges were eventually dismissed after Zimmerman was indicted by a federal grand jury on two counts of production, one count of possession and one count of receipt of child pornography, according to court documents.

His sentencing is set for Jan. 9, 2008, before Hanen.

Zimmerman faces a minimum of 10 years in prison and a maximum of 20 years per count.