Child molester, pornographer gets 20 years

A Park Ridge man was sentenced to 20 years in prison Wednesday for molesting an 8-year-old Lake Zurich girl and taking pornographic pictures of her.

Phillip Hefland, 45, was facing a maximum of 22 years in the case.

Hefland, of 2224 Parkside Drive, was arrested in May 2006 after a woman he hired to live in his house and care for his mother found a hidden camera. The woman found the camera in her bedroom.

The woman called police, and during their questioning of Hefland they found hundreds of images of child pornography on his computer.

Lake County Assistant State's Attorney Ari Fisz said the photos were primarily downloaded from the Internet. However, officials also found photos of a girl, then 8 years old, that Hefland had shot himself. He admitted he molested the girl at the time.

Hefland identified the girl as someone he had been paid to baby sit between 1999 and 2001, and police traced her to Lake Zurich.

Hefland pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography in Cook County last year and was sentenced to four years in prison.

In Lake County last month, he pleaded guilty to production of child pornography and aggravated criminal sexual abuse.

Defense attorney James Schwarzbach asked for a sentence near the minimum of seven years, saying Hefland had shown remorse and was in failing health.

But Circuit Judge Fred Foreman went to the higher end of the range, calling the crime "one the most despicable acts I have seen."