A participant in a child pornography ring whose online activities included watching live broadcasts of the repeated rapes of a 6-year-old Cumberland County boy has been sentenced to 25 years in federal prison.

The punishment U.S. Middle District Senior Judge Yvette Kane imposed on Dylan Heatherly falls short of the penalty the prosecutor sought in the case, however. Assistant U.S. Attorney Meredith A. Taylor urged Kane to put Heatherly behind bars for 40 years.

Heatherly is among 14 people arrested from an investigation when a Canadian law enforcement officer discovered the child sexual abuse the ring members were airing and/or watching.

The most culpable offender, William Augusta of Carlisle, who raped the boy while the others watched, is serving the longest prison term of any member of the group. He was sentenced to 60 years in federal prison, coupled with a 45- to 90-year state prison term.

A federal jury convicted Heatherly for his role in the crimes in January 2018.

The acts of Heatherly and the others in the ring constitute “true cruelty,” Taylor wrote in a sentencing memorandum. She cited a log of comments the watchers made while the boy was being raped as they cheered Augusta on.

Ehen investigators accessed Heatherly’s electronic devices they found he “possessed images of infants being orally raped, as well as toddlers being anally raped,” Taylor said.

She said she sought the long jail term for Heatherly to at least try to mitigate some of the pain inflicted on the boy Augusta raped.

“There can be no explanation, justification or mitigation for the types of vile offenses committed by Heatherly and his co-defendants,” Taylor wrote. “The victim of his crimes – the child depicted during the worst moments of his life – is the one who experiences and will continue to experience challenges beyond imagination.”

“Heatherly must be held responsible for (his) depraved actions in that online chatroom,” she added.

In addition to the prison term, Kane fined Heatherly $3,000 and ordered him to spend 15 years on probation after his release.

Heatherly was the tenth person to be sentenced from the Augusta ring. Besides Augusta, the others received prison terms ranging from 16 ¼ to 40 years, with most in the 30-year range. Two defendants died after being indicted in 2016. Two are awaiting sentencing.