Couple Sentenced To 880 Years In Prison For Sexually Exploiting Children

A couple who kidnap young girls and subject them to sexual exploitation have been sentenced to 880 years in prison. The couple recently exploited six young girls, including two Amish sisters they kidnapped from their family's roadside farm stand last year. Stephen Howells, 40, was given 580 years in prison, and his former girlfriend Nicole Vaisey, 26, got 300 years, reports the Syracuse Post-Standard. The two Amish girls, aged 6 and 11, were abducted in August 2014 in the town of Heuvelton, near the Canadian border. Prosecutors claimed Howells and Vaisey had planned to keep the girls as sex slaves but released them a day later after sexually abusing them because they hadn't finished building a soundproof prison cell in their home and were worried neighbors would hear the girls screaming.

"You are the threat that parents worry about every day," "You are the nightmare that never goes away for children." U.S. District Judge Glenn Suddaby told the defendants in court Thursday. "The sentences imposed today are a reflection of the monstrous crimes committed by Stephen M. Howells, II and Nicole F. Vaisey against the most vulnerable among us – our children. Howells and Vaisey will never be able to abduct, drug and sexually abuse children again," reports WWNY-TV.

Howells admitted to abusing four other children, dating back to December 2012. This May, he pleaded guilty to 21 counts of sexually exploiting children and child pornography.