What is so frightening about Matt's case? It could happen to anyone. They just had it built into their mind that this kid is guilty." "They just kept on asking me and kept on thinking that I did it. "They didn't care that I denied it," Matthew said. "I thought his chances of winning were probably 20 percent," said Novak. Novak said that the pictures alone were practically all the evidence the police needed. And even though there was no proof that Matthew personally downloaded those nine pictures, it would be difficult to prove his innocence. Matt's dreams had been destroyed and his mother was crushed.
I don't want to disappoint anybody, but I just can't go on anymore.'" "He said 'Mom, I'm hurting,'" said Jeannie. The stress of the situation got so bad for Matthew that he told his parents the charges hanging over his head made high school impossible. The shy young boy could not explain how such pictures appeared on his computer hard drive. "If they found out that I was wearing an ankle bracelet all of a sudden they would be wondering, why are you wearing that? And I had no good answer for them." He wore longer pants to hide the ankle bracelet, but he was scared he would be discovered. Matthew was in an awful predicament, and he tried to keep his house arrest a secret. I didn't know why it was happening," Matthew recalled. As soon as Matthew was charged, he was put on virtual house arrest, and an electronic bracelet was attached to his ankle to monitor his movements 24 hours a day. He's never been a problem, never stayed out late and gotten into trouble or anything like that."Īrizona child pornography laws are among the harshest in the country.
They were shocked at the serious charges against him and frightened by the prospect of such a serious sentence. Greg and Jeannie Bandy knew their son well. He would have served time until he died." In other words, he would have been sentenced to 90 years in prison. "If Matt was convicted, those sentences would have to be served consecutively. "We faced 10 years per count, there were nine counts," said Novak. "20/20" correspondent Jim Avila asked Novak what the family was up against. The family hired Ed Novak, a well-respected attorney from a large law firm in downtown Phoenix. The Bandys would soon find out just how serious the charges against Matthew were. "I said, 'What do we do now? Should I contact a lawyer?' said, 'Well, they are felonies that the state takes very serious.'" "I still remember when they were cleaning up and leaving and of course I was still in my pajamas and my bathrobe and my fuzzy slippers," Jeannie Bandy said. Still, it didn't look good for Matt, as police confiscated the computer and left the house that December day. just adult pornography…Playboy-like images."ĭifficult to admit, but not illegal - or so it seemed. "I got the Web site from a bunch of friends at school. He had been sneaking peaks at adult erotic photos on the family computer. Nevertheless, Matthew did have an embarrassing confession. "When they asked me have you ever looked up or uploaded or downloaded erotic images of minors, I was just taken aback and…I said, 'No,'" says Matthew. Yahoo monitors chat rooms for suspicious content and reported that child porn was uploaded from the computer at the Bandys' home address. According to the warrant, nine images of young girls in suggestive poses were found on the Bandy family computer. Greg Bandy was handed the search warrant and informed that the central suspect was Matthew. "And then there police officers with guns pointed at me, telling me to get downstairs." "The first thing I thought was, someone's trying to break in our house," Matthew said. Police officers stormed into the house with guns pointed.
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