STROUDSBURG, Pa. (AP) — An eastern Pennsylvania jury has convicted a former U.N. weapons inspector nabbed in an online sex sting on all but one count.
Jurors in Monroe County convicted 49-year-old Scott Ritter, of Delmar, N.Y., on six of seven counts, including unlawful contact with a minor. He was acquitted on a criminal attempt charge.
Ritter had no reaction as the verdict was announced Thursday. His twin 18-year-old daughters sobbed.
Prosecutors say Ritter exchanged explicit messages with a detective posing as an underage girl and masturbated even after the undercover officer stressed during the chat that he was a minor.
Ritter was the U.N.’s chief weapons inspector in Iraq from 1991 to 1998. He resigned after accusing the U.S. and the U.N. of failing to get tough with Saddam Hussein. Later, he became a vocal critic of the U.S. invasion.