A North Augusta man was found with child sexual abuse materials on his HP laptop, authorities said.
James Clifford Hatmaker, Jr., 59, of Figtree Court, North Augusta, was charged with five charges connected to the sexual exploitation of minors.
Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Force investigators with the Aiken County Sheriff’s Office made the arrest. Investigators with the S.C. Attorney General’s Office, also a member of the state’s ICAC Task Force, assisted with the investigation.
Investigators received a CyberTipline report from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) which led them to Hatmaker. Investigators state Hatmaker possessed multiple files of child sexual abuse material*.
Some of the materials found Aug. 11 on his HP computer include a young girl, age 5-7, providing oral sex to an adult male and another girl aged 3-5 being raped by an adult male, according to warrants.
Hatmaker is charged with five counts of sexual exploitation of a minor, third degree (§16-15-410), a felony offense punishable by up to 10 years imprisonment on each count. This case will be prosecuted by the Attorney General’s Office.
The case follows another recent arrest in Aiken County for a similar crime. According to reports, Craig Newell, 25, of Windsor, was charged on Aug. 4 with five counts of sexual exploitation with a minor. The South Carolina Attorney General’s Office first alerted the Aiken Sheriff’s Office on July 17, 2020.
Warrants served by deputies suggest that pornographic files of victims ages 3 to 12 were found on Newell’s desktop inside his home, where they eventually arrested him.
According to reports, South Carolina’s Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force tracked Newell. From there, Aiken County authorities got involved.
* Child sexual abuse material, or CSAM, is a more accurate reflection of the material involved in these heinous and abusive crimes, according to state officials. “Pornography” can imply the child was a consenting participant. Globally, the term child pornography is being replaced by CSAM for this reason.
Greg Rickabaugh is the Jail Report Contributor for The Augusta Press. Reach him at greg.rickabaugh@theaugustapress.com.
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