Former college professor Eugene Anderson asked a Kanawha County judge on Monday for the maximum prison sentence for abusing two boys more than a decade ago.
Anderson, 65, pleaded guilty to 10 counts of sexual abuse by a parent, guardian or person in a position of trust and eight counts of third-degree sexual assault.
Circuit Judge Tod Kaufman agreed to hand down the maximum sentence the charges carry - between 60 and 200 years in prison. Anderson wiped tears from his eyes and thanked the judge after the sentencing.
Anderson, a former professor at Marietta College in Ohio, who has a doctorate in mathematics from the University of Wisconsin, is already serving a more than 80-year prison sentence given by a Wood County judge and hasn't started to serve the more than 70-year prison sentence handed down by a Washington County, Ohio, judge. Both of those sentences are from convictions on charges involving child pornography.
On Monday, Anderson begged Kaufman to make the sentence he imposed a consecutive one - meaning it would be stacked on top of the others.
"I won't be getting out of prison anyway" Anderson told the judge. "I want to know at some time, I'm doing time for those victims."
Anderson told the judge that in the late 1990s, he sexually abused two boys, ages 13 and 14.
"Out of all the things I've been convicted of, none of it concerned those two," he said. "There has been no justice for them."
During at least one of the investigations into Anderson in Ohio and West Virginia, accusations involving the boys were made, but Anderson said Monday that he had convinced the boys to lie on the witness stand about the abuse.
It wasn't until Anderson contacted a State Police trooper, who had come to Mount Olive Correctional Complex to speak to his therapy group, that he admitted to abusing the boys, his lawyer, John Sullivan, a Kanawha public defender said Monday.
"Mr. Anderson brought about the charges himself," Sullivan told the judge. "He waited until after his ex-wife died so he wouldn't bring any more shame. He feels like he's gotten away with something he shouldn't have."
When Anderson was 41 years old, in 1991, he started looking for male prostitutes, he told the judge. At the time, in addition to working at Marietta College, he was also teaching classes through Marshall University in Charleston.
An 18-year-old he had met introduced him to the 13-year-old boy, he said. On several occasions, Anderson brought the boy to Charleston with him.
Anderson said he would perform oral sex on the 13-year-old and the boy's 14-year-old friend. Both of the boys' mothers knew and trusted Anderson, he told the judge.
Assistant Kanawha prosecutor Tera Salango asked Kaufman to sentence Anderson to the maximum prison sentence, but not because that's what he wanted.
"These boys were very vulnerable," Salango said. "They seemed to be living troubled lives and here's this older male who buys them gifts and takes them on trips they otherwise never would have been given."
While incarcerated in Mount Olive, Anderson wrote letters to a trooper, confessing to the abuse. He also provided written statements that were presented to a Kanawha grand jury.
Both victims provided statements that were presented to the grand jury, Salango said.
Anderson told Kaufman that he hoped he would be a role model for other prisoners at Mount Olive. He's considering writing a book and he said the proceeds would go to the victims.
"I want them to know everything that happened was my fault," he said.
Reach Kate White at kate.white@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-1723 or follow @KateLWhite on Twitter.