Former Air Force Special Agent Sentenced to 10 Years for Molesting Child

The abuse occurred at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington State between October 2017 and April 2018.

The Department of Justice building in Washington on Jan. 2, 2020. Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times

A former Air Force special agent was sentenced to 10 years in prison on Jan. 8 for sexually molesting a young child left in his care at a military base, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ).

Joshua Carl Harrod, a 44-year-old resident of Spanaway, Washington, was charged with enticement of a minor in July 2021 and pleaded guilty in October 2023.

He also pleaded guilty to making a false statement to a government agency after attempting to falsify phone records related to evidence in the case, the DOJ stated.

According to court records, Mr. Harrod sexually molested a young child left in his care while he was stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord—an area of exclusive federal jurisdiction—between October 2017 and April 2018.

He was with the Air Force at the time of the abuse but later separated from the Air Force in 2018 to serve as a recruiter for the Army National Guard in Lakewood, Washington.

Mr. Harrod was arrested in July 2021. The DOJ said at the time that Mr. Harrod was charged with five counts of sexual abuse of a child under the age of 12.

‘Indescribably Cruel’

In handing his sentence on Jan. 7, U.S. District Judge Benjamin Settle described Mr. Harrod’s crimes as “sadistic” and “indescribably cruel.” The judge sentenced Mr. Harrod to 10 years in jail and ordered him to be on lifetime supervised release.

“The consequences of many crimes before me do not have the impact that this one does… Victims of these crimes carry with them a life sentence,” the judge stated.

The case was investigated by the FBI with assistance from the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations (OSI), Joint Base Lewis-McChord Military Police Investigations, the Lakewood Police Department, and the Washington State Patrol.

In another case, a 40-year-old Yelm, Washington man named Scotti Jason Ortiz was sentenced to 10 years in prison on Dec. 1 for possession of images of child sexual abuse.

Mr. Ortiz was served a search warrant after being identified as a Kik user who had been distributing images of child sexual abuse.

This came after a foreign law enforcement agency alerted Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Cyber Crimes Center (C3) Child Exploitation Investigations Unit about the activity.

Mr. Ortiz was found to possess a video showing the sexual molestation of three children under the age of 12, although it does not appear that he created the images, the DOJ stated.