Judge Resigns After Prosecutors Find Thousands of Photos of Nude Defendants on Computer

On Monday, a district judge in Arkansas permanently resigned from public office after investigators discovered more then 4,000 photos of naked young men identified as former defendants on his computer, NBC News reports.

Earlier this year, ethics officials accused Cross County District Judge Joseph Boeckmann of giving at least 12 young men—including one under the age of 18—lighter sentences in exchange for sexual favors performed at his home. From WREG-TV:

One inmate said Judge Boeckmann sent him a note asking to ‘spend some time with him.’

He took the note as sexual in nature and gave it back to the guard, refusing to meet him.

In the courtroom the next day he said Boeckmann was angry.

“I’m going to charge you 500 and an extra night in jail, and you go back there and tell your buddies how I feel about it,” he recalled the judge as saying.

According to the Arkansas Judicial Discipline and Disability Commission, the recently recovered photos show naked young men “in various poses inside the judge’s home and outside in his yard” after having apparently been paddled.

“The paddle appears in photographs and has been identified by defendants as belonging to the judge,” wrote the Commission in a letter sent to Boeckmann’s lawyers earlier this month. “Please accept this as notice to your client to not destroy [or] otherwise dispose of this paddle or other devices used to cause these red marks.”

In February, Boeckmann denied any wrongdoing and claimed the photos “may have been taken to corroborate a defendant’s participation in community service.” So far, no criminal charges have been filed against Boeckmann.