But on Tuesday, two of the young men sat in a federal courtroom in St. Paul as Anton Martynenko was sentenced to 38 years in prison for running a massive sextortion scheme described as the largest child porn production case ever prosecuted in Minnesota. "We all can now be given freedom from this," said one victim, identified in court only as Grant, after the sentence came down. Prosecutors sought a 40-year prison sentence for Anton Martynenko, but two years were shaved off his sentence for giving federal investigators notes on jail conversations he had with Danny Heinrich, the man who killed Jacob Wetterling. Sextortion case 
 
 According to court documents, Martynenko “regularly scoured internet sites devoted to high school athletes to locate his targets.” In many cases, he posed as a teenage girl to solicit nude photos from the boys, which he then posted on social media. Assistant U.S. Attorney Carol Kayser called Martynenko a "tenacious predator" who persisted in his four-year scheme even after interacting with local and federal law enforcement agencies. Prosecutors said Martynenko lured at least three boys into performing sex acts on him, and that two of his victims later committed suicide. Marsh Halberg, an attorney for Martynenko, sought the mandatory minimum of 15 years for the three child pornography charges to which his client pleaded guilty.
– What's said to have been the biggest child-pornography production case in Minnesota history ended Tuesday in a St. Paul courtroom, and two of the victims faced down their tormenter there. "We all can now be given freedom from this," one of the unnamed victims, now a young man, said after Anton Martynenko, 32, was sentenced to 38 years in prison for what the Minneapolis Star Tribune calls a "massive sextortion scheme." How that scheme worked: Martynenko would set up fake online profiles (often as teen girls) to lure teen boys into sending him nude pics, which he'd then post online. All told, he tricked more than 155 boys, mainly between 14 and 16, in multiple states, KMSP reports. Martynenko, who pleaded guilty in January, "delighted in the humiliation, embarrassment, and potential negative consequences his actions caused his victims," prosecutors said, per court docs. Once Martynenko had the boys' photos, he'd threaten to post the pics online, and he'd often follow through. He also managed to persuade three boys into committing sexual acts on him, and two of his victims ended up killing themselves. One of the victims who appeared in court, now 21, said "my life has become a living hell" from the experience, while the other, who's around 19, noted Martynenko was "a terrible human being who spent years of his life making hundreds of teen boys miserable." Side note: Martynenko had two years lopped off his sentence for helping investigators on the Jacob Wetterling case. He'd shared a jail cell with Danny Heinrich, Jacob's killer, at one point and had apparently procured information. (The break in the Wetterling case came in September after 27 years.)