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| Anthony Weiner sentenced to 21 months in jail for sexting an underage girl | Anthony Weiner sentenced to 21 months in jail for sexting an underage girl |
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| Anthony Weiner has been sentenced by a judge to 21 months in jail following his latest sexting scandal. The former New York congressman pleaded guilty to one charge of transferring obscene material to a minor. Prosecutors say he broke the law by having illicit contact with a 15-year-old girl using Skype and Snapchat. | Anthony Weiner has been sentenced by a judge to 21 months in jail following his latest sexting scandal. The former New York congressman pleaded guilty to one charge of transferring obscene material to a minor. Prosecutors say he broke the law by having illicit contact with a 15-year-old girl using Skype and Snapchat. |
| Weiner was hoping that he might be sentenced to probation instead of hard time in prison, and his lawyers had argued that their client was sick and in need of therapy, not incarceration. | Weiner was hoping that he might be sentenced to probation instead of hard time in prison, and his lawyers had argued that their client was sick and in need of therapy, not incarceration. |
| "I have a sickness, but I do not have an excuse," Weiner said in May when he plead guilty to the charge of transmitting obscene material to a minor. | "I have a sickness, but I do not have an excuse," Weiner said in May when he plead guilty to the charge of transmitting obscene material to a minor. |
| The prison sentence marks a new low in Weiner's stunning personal and political fall from grace. As a member of Congress, Weiner gained notoriety as a feisty speaker on the House floor. Now, as he begins his sentence, Weiner has lost his career and his wife, Huma Abedin, a top aide to Hillary Clinton who announced she would seek divorce after the latest sexting scandal. | |
| Ms Abedin filed for divorce on the same day that Weiner plead guilty in May. | |
| The conviction follows after media reports in 2016 exposed that Weiner had sexted with a 15-year-old girl, sparking investigations by the FBI and the New York Police Department. Weeks earlier, a photo Weiner sent to a woman had been discovered showing Weiner lying in bed with his toddler next to him. | |
| That sexting scandal was the third such scandal to dog Weiner. The first scandal, in 2011, followed after Weiner sent a photo of his genitals - concealed by boxer briefs - to a 21-year-old college student who followed him on Twitter. Weiner initially refused to admit that it was him in the photograph, before ultimately admitting ownership of the picture during a press conference in New York. He later resigned from Congress as a result of the scandal. | |
| The second scandal occured in 2013 during Weiner's campaign to be mayor of New York. He quickly became the front runner in the Democratic primary then, but pictures and sexts he had sent to a 22-year-old woman were obtained by the press. He went on to finish in fifth place in the race to become mayor of New York, after losing the trust of the voters in the city. |