A child molestation case that began in 2002 came to and end Thursday with the judge combining the prosecution’s suggestion for jail time and the defense’s suggestion of heavily supervised probation in sentencing.

Windell Chadwick “Chad” Thomas, 33, of Villa Rica was sentenced by Coweta Judicial Circuit Judge Robert Malice to serve 30 years followed by 30 years of closely supervised probation for the charges of aggravated child molestation, child molestation, sexual exploitation of a child and two counts of violating the Georgia Controlled Substances Act. On Nov. 21, Thomas entered a guilty but mentally ill plea to those charges.

Thomas is currently serving a 10-year sentence from entering a guilty plea to five other similar charges in 2002. Malice said he would give Thomas credit for time served and allow the sentences to run concurrent. Thomas’s jail time would be up in 2032.

On May 10, 2002, Thomas was arrested after the Carroll County Sheriff’s Office executed a search warrant at his home and found child pornography, drugs and about eight hours of home videos showing Thomas performing oral sex and masturbating with young boys. Investigators identified seven victims on the tapes, and Thomas was indicted by a grand jury on 36 charges related to molestation and drugs.

Thomas pleaded guilty to five charges, for which he is now serving the 10-year sentence. He also pleaded guilty to aggravated sodomy and received a life sentence which was overturned on appeal. He was re-indicted on charges involving one of the victims in 2003.

On Thursday, Thomas was represented by attorneys Brian Steel, Jim Berry and Bud Sieman, who argued that their client suffered from bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder - the result of a lifetime of abuse - and should be sentenced to 60 years of intensely supervised probation.

During the sentencing hearing, which ran all day, District Attorney Pete Skandalakis called sheriff’s Investigator Diane Henderson and the mother and grandmother of one of Thomas’s victims. They boy named in the indictment Thomas was sentenced for Thursday was 7 when he was first molested and is now 15.

Henderson testified that the victim and his mother came to the sheriff’s office on May 7, 2002, and she interviewed the boy.

“He basically stated that Mr. Thomas taught him sex,” she said.

During the interview, Henderson found out the abuse had started in 1999 and she asked the victim why he had not come forward sooner. His answer, she said, was that Thomas threatened him.

“(The victim) stated each time, especially when it first started, he (Thomas) told him if he told anyone and he went to jail ... he’d kill him,” she said.

On May 10, 2002 deputies and investigators went to Thomas’s home in Villa Rica to serve a search warrant. Henderson said they were looking for items like videos, pornography and marijuana, which the victim had described to them.

During cross-examination, Steel asked Henderson to describe the conditions Thomas was living in.

“The furniture was upside-down. Animal feces were about the house,” she said. “Mr. Thomas stated he was preparing to move, and that’s why the house was in disarray.”

Inside the house, Henderson said a safe, later found to have pornography, and videos of Thomas and his victims and drugs was discovered. Still images were taken from the tapes, Henderson said, so parents of other victims could identify their children.

The victim’s family members testified that Thomas was a trusted family friend who became a friend to the victim after he was in a car accident in 1999 at the age of 7.

“When (the victim) as at the hospital, Chad became a fixture there,” the mother said. “Anything we needed, Chad was Johnny-on-the-spot.”

After her son was released from the hospital, his mother said Thomas would come to their house, sometimes sleeping over to help with chores and errands so she wouldn’t have to leave her son. As he got better, the mother said her son would go to Thomas’s house and sometimes stay the night.

When her son was about 8-and-a-half, the mother said Thomas started coming around less, but the victim developed strange medical conditions. At the time, the victim was in the fourth grade, and his mother said she repeatedly had to pick him up from school because he had an upset stomach or diarrhea. When he got home, he was fine. After several doctor visits and no answer, the mother said she told her son he needed to tell her what was wrong.

“I wanted to know what’s going on. I attributed it to something at school,” she testified. He then told her Thomas had molested him.

Since reporting the abuse, the victim has lived in fear, his mother said. He insists the blinds stay closed at their house, and he’s afraid to answer the door.

“Up until this year, he was kind of a loner,” she said. “This year he just blossomed and found himself.”

The victim’s mother said she knew Thomas since high school and described him as “fun-loving.”

“He never seemed to have a down day,” she said.

The victim’s grandmother echoed those observations.

“Chad was a very dear friend of myself and of my family. He was a brother, a friend and a son. I believed Chad to be a loving, caring, compassionate person,” she said. “I know a different Chad now. I know Chad took the love and trust of a family and abused it.”

A psychologist who treated Thomas and his mother painted a different picture of him. For most of his life, Freda Thomas testified, her son was abused by the adults around him.

Freda testified that her son was the result of rape. She said that while working at the Department of Motor Vehicles, her boss began sexually assaulting her, which lasted for seven years.

“When he was born, all I could see was my sexual abuser. I couldn’t bond with my son,” she said. “I berated him. I called him names. I would whip him.”

When Thomas was 18 months old, Freda said she left her husband, Ted Thomas, who believed he was Thomas’s biological father. She said she was scared of Thomas’s biological father who, she said, came to her house with a sawed-off shotgun and told her he was a mob hit man. Although she eventually told Ted the truth, she said he wanted to remain Thomas’s father.

“Ted Thomas said to me, ‘He is my son, and we’re never talking about it again,’” she said.

Although he agreed to be Thomas’s father, Freda said Ted abused him, as did her second husband. She also testified that her mother abused Thomas and insisted on bathing him until he was 9 years old.

“Was there any major authority figure in Chad’s life when he was growing up who was not either verbally or physically abusive or both?” Steel asked.

“There was not,” Freda said.

Both Freda and Dr. Marti Loring testified that at ages 11 and 13, Thomas was taken to doctors with various mental and behavioral problems. Loring said at age 13, Thomas had rectal bleeding, which was the result of molestation, but that it was never followed up on.

Malice asked Freda why she took her son for a mental evaluation at age 11.

“Because of the things I had put him through,” she said. She added that she never learned that doctor’s diagnosis.

Skandalakis pressed her, asking why she didn’t press the doctor for answers.

“I don’t know that I cared,” she said.

Loring said through interviews with Thomas, his family and a review of his medical records, she saw a lifetime of abuse and signs that he had bipolar disorder and PTSD. She testified that Thomas had been sexually abused at least four times - the first at age 7, and once by his grandfather.

Thomas also, she said, did not know the truth about his father until the morning of his sentencing hearing.

In Thomas’s medical history, there were signs that he was bipolar, but the term was never used until after he was arrested in 2002, Loring said. A psychological evaluation noted classic signs of mania.

“He would be very up and excitable beyond the point of normal and then very depressed,” Loring said.

Although he was abused, molested and suffering from mental illness, Loring said Thomas was not so ill he did not try to get better.

“In spite of the abuse he was struggling with, he continued to try to do well,” she said. “Even when he was struggling with agitation and depression he was able to pull himself out of it. At what point the full bipolar set in is in question.”

Freda testified that at age 17, Thomas moved out of the house and started supporting himself. At 19, Thomas got married, but was divorced at 21 and also put on antidepressants.

“Bipolar and post-traumatic stress disorder got the best of him,” Loring said. “He was no longer able to pull himself up by his bootstraps.”

Loring said in 2000, Thomas began having bouts of psychosis where he thought worms were crawling on him. He would often wear multiple layers of clothing and scrub himself with bleach.

Before pleading guilty, Skandalakis said Thomas was going to plead not guilty by reason of insanity. Loring and another doctor submitted reports saying Thomas may not have known what he was doing at the time he abused his victims. Skandalakis asked Loring if her opinion changed.

“I want to be careful in answering that question,” Loring said. “It’s just a little more complicated than whether he knew if it was right or wrong. It’s possible he knew it was wrong but he felt so grandiose, so mentally ill, that it was his impression that it was OK.”

The defense also called two expert witnesses who testified about the effects bipolar disorder and PTSD can have on patients, including increased sexuality and increased sexual deviance, and that with treatment those urges could be controlled. Owners of two companies that could provide treatment and monitoring of Thomas also told the court about the alternatives to jail time, which Freda would pay for.

Before sentencing, the victim’s mother and grandmother both read victim impact statements asking that Thomas be jailed.

“(The victim) is now 15 and lives a fairly normal life, if you call living in fear a normal life,” his mother said. “Once he’s in prison for good, we can assure (the victim) he’s safe.”

Thomas also briefly addressed the court.

“I’m very sorry for what I did,” he said. “My intentions were never to hurt anyone, but I know I did.”

He told Malice he was not receiving psychological treatment in jail and wanted to be somewhere where he could.

Malice asked Thomas if, as Loring said some people with bipolar disorder do, he thought he was helping the children he molested.

“Honestly, sir, at the time I did,” he said.

Skandalakis asked Malice to sentence Thomas to 30 years of jail time followed by 30 years of intensely supervised probation. He said that the sentence both “protects children and sends a message to the community.”

Before asking Malice to consider a 60-year, supervised probation term, Steel let Freda address the court.

“My child went through the same things,” she said. “He never had the opportunity to be a child.

“I lost my child before he was ever born because I couldn’t love him. Give him a chance to prove to society that there is rehabilitation.”

In sentencing Thomas, Malice said he was reluctant to grant the request for probation.

“My greatest fear is if I do what your capable attorneys have asked, Mr. Thomas, is that you would have the opportunity in the future to commit other acts upon other innocent boys.”