Last Wednesday, 39-year-old Jason Robert Wesely of Salem, was sentenced to 100 months in federal prison for possession of child pornography.

Law enforcement received a cybertip from a social media platform in May 2020, reporting that Wesley had sexual conversations with an undercover agent posing as a 14-year-old. Further investigation revealed that Wesely, a former member of the Iowa National Guard, belonged to a group chat where child pornography was shared among its members. After admitting to viewing and sharing child pornography, Wesely was ultimately discharged from the National Guard. Following his sentence, Wesely is required to serve eight years of supervised release. There is no parole in the federal system.

The case was prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Iowa as part of the U.S. Department of Justice’s “Project Safe Childhood”. The initiative was started in 2006 as an effort to combine law enforcement investigations and prosecutions, community action, and public awareness in order to reduce the sexual exploitation of children. Anyone with knowledge of a child being sexually abused is encouraged to call the Iowa Sexual Abuse Hotline at 800-284-7821.