A Woodbury man was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison Wednesday for extorting teenage girls he met on social media to send him sexually explicit photos and videos.

Timothy Lennard Gebhart, 38, admitted in July to coercing two girls, ages 16 and 14, to engage in sexually explicit conduct through video chat, which he recorded. He then sent the videos and photos to other minors in an attempt to get more.

Timothy Lennard Gebhart (Courtesy of the Sherburne County Sheriff’s Office)

Prosecutors said Gebhart executed the “sextortion” scheme between July 2021 and September 2023 while using aliases and posing as someone younger, including as a teenager. He extorted money and other items of value from the 16-year-old by threatening to send the videos to her family, friends and classmates.

The girls are among six victims — from Minnesota, Texas, Indiana and elsewhere — who authorities were able to identify in Gebhart’s scheme, according to prosecutors. Additional victims have not been identified.

“The scheme continued for more than two years and didn’t stop until the police stopped him,” Assistant U.S. Attorney David Classen said in his sentencing argument before Judge Jerry Blackwell in U.S. District Court in St. Paul.

Classen called Gebhart’s crimes “harmful, and cruel to the extreme.”

“These are the crimes that shatter childhoods and ruin lives,” Classen said, adding research shows victims go on to struggle with a lifetime of anxiety and fear of physical contact.

Gebhart pleaded guilty in March to all four charges in the June 2024 indictment: two counts of child pornography production, and one count each of child pornography distribution and interstate communication with the intent to extort.

The prosecution sought the 30-year term, while Gebhart’s attorney asked for a mandatory minimum 15-year sentence. Gebhart will be on intensive supervised release for 10 years following incarceration.

Intimidation, blackmail

According to court documents, Gebhart used Instagram and Snapchat to find his victims. He convinced them to send photos and videos of themselves engaged in sexually explicit conduct, sometimes in exchange for money.

Gebhart then targeted the victims’ social media contacts to find more victims to exploit, prosecutors said. He mentioned his relationships with the new victims to gain their trust.

Gebhart knew the ages of his victims because they either told him or it was apparent from their social media profiles, prosecutors said.

After receiving videos and photos, Gebhart turned to intimidation and blackmail to receive more, the indictment said. He told one victim in a November 2021 message that if she didn’t call him in one hour he would “ruin your (expletive) day. Wonder what your family will think of those pics I have of you.”

Gebhart also sent his victims “graphic and explicit videos of suicides and violent murders to coerce and intimidate the minor victims,” the indictment read.

Gebhart declined to address the court before hearing his sentence.

Reports rising

Sextortion is a growing issue, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Every day last year the organization received nearly 100 reports of financial sextortion, which involves a predator demanding money for keeping sexual images private.

Gebhart’s case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat child sexual exploitation and abuse. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, go to justice.gov/psc.

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By WILL WEISSERT

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has made hardline immigration policies a signature issue, but acknowledged on Wednesday that he’s been criticized for recently saying some skilled immigrants should be allowed into the country from his “Make America Great Again” supporters.

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Trump told an audience of business executives that the U.S. needs immigrants who can train domestic workers in high-tech factories — and insisted that doing so is not inconsistent with his core political beliefs.

“I love my conservative friends. I love MAGA. But this is MAGA,” Trump said during an address to the U.S.-Saudi Investment Forum, which he attended with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. “Those people are going to teach our people how to make computer chips, and in a short period of time, our people are going to be doing great. And those people can go home.”

The comments drew applause in the room. But last week, Trump sparred with Fox News host Laura Ingraham over the same issue. Ingraham suggested during an interview with Trump that “you can’t flood the country with tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands, of foreign workers,” only to have the president respond, “You also do have to bring in talent.”

When Ingraham said that the U.S. had “plenty of talented people here,” Trump said, “No, you don’t,” and added that “people have to learn.”

The exchange drew swift and sharp online criticism from some corners of the MAGA movement, who have opposed expanding H-1B visas, and other programs designed to let skilled immigrants into the country.

That didn’t stop Trump from doubling down on Wednesday, adding that his detractors are “really, really smart” despite their opposition to skilled immigration. “They’re unbelievable patriots,” Trump said. “But they just don’t understand our people need to be taught.”

Trump said that when it comes to “extremely complex” domestic plants making things like computers, cell phones and missiles, it wasn’t possible to “think you can hire people off an unemployment line to run it.”

Foreign owners building the plants in the U.S. are “going to have to bring thousands of people with them, and I’m going to welcome those people,” Trump said.

As evidence, the president pointed to the case of hundreds of South Korean nationals who were detained and left the U.S. following a September immigration raid at Hyundai’s electric vehicle manufacturing site in Georgia. Some have now returned and are back at their jobs.

Trump said the workers had been ordered to “get out,” but that “I said, ‘Stop it. Don’t be stupid.’”

Sarah Tripple walked through Washington County’s first homeless shelter on Wednesday morning, stopping often to point out some of her favorite features — and struggling to rank them against each other.

Washington County Community Services Division Manager Sarah Tripple shows off a fully accessible residential room. (Claudia Staut / Pioneer Press)

“This is a fully accessible room,” said Tripple, division manager of Washington County Community Services, walking into a spacious room with its own bathroom, a double bed, side table, desk, desk chair, dresser and lounge chair.

“The trend we’ve been seeing is that the folks coming into our program are trending older and have more physical disabilities, so when we designed this building, we wanted to make sure that we were as ADA compliant as possible,” she said.

The room — one of two in the Stillwater shelter that is fully accessible — features a wide doorway, grab bars in the bathroom and a “roll-in” shower, she said.

“The windows open, so they can get some air in here,” Tripple said. “And they have a thermostat that they can move a couple of degrees one way or the other.”

Down the hall of the $12 million Emergency Housing Services Building, located on 1.5 acres on the south end of the Washington County Government Center campus in Stillwater, is a lounge area and game room with a TV. A quieter lounge area and library — complete with books from local libraries — can be found on the second floor.

‘We’ve been negligent’

The shelter, which will open the second week of December, will provide short-term emergency housing to individuals over the age of 18. With 30 private rooms, each with their own bathroom, it will provide adults experiencing homelessness a place to stay while county officials help them find permanent housing and employment, Tripple said.

The average stay is expected to be around 90 days. The shelter will be staffed 24/7 and residents will have access to social-service support, transportation assistance, well-being support, legal help and help in gathering essential documents. There is a computer lab for job searches and workforce development, a commercial kitchen and shared dining area, storage space and parking. Each room can be locked; residents will have access to their room via a key card, Tripple said.

On any given night, an average of 166 people in Washington County experience homelessness, according to county officials. Historically, as many as 54 residents each year have had to seek shelter outside the county.

“I think we’ve been negligent as a county in providing this service,” said Commissioner Fran Miron, who represents the northern part of Washington County. “Ramsey and Hennepin counties have been doing most of this work for some time, and I know a lot of our people that need emergency housing have been going into those counties to secure that. Now we’ve stepped up to the plate, and we’re doing the work that’s necessary.”

Miron said the county’s population will be judged on how well the “most needy among us” are treated. “I’ve heard the gospel readings in church many, many times,” Miron said.

Commissioner Bethany Cox, who represents the Stillwater area, was one of the featured speakers at the shelter’s ribbon cutting on Wednesday morning. “Homelessness does not discriminate,” Cox told the audience. “It touches individuals and families across our county, often during the most vulnerable moments of their lives. This building stands as a testament to compassion backed by action. The idea for this facility grew out of the pandemic, and when we had to quickly adapt and use hotels to shelter our most vulnerable residents, we knew there was a better way. That experience taught us valuable lessons about flexibility, about dignity, and the importance of safe spaces.”

County officials have been using Asteria Inn & Suites in Stillwater, which is just a half-mile west of the site, to provide emergency housing. Most of the 11 people currently being housed at the hotel are 60 and above, said Jennifer Castillo, Washington County’s director of community services. The oldest person served by the program has been 80, she said.

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Older people can sometimes be harder to find housing for because of fixed incomes, mobility issues and difficulty finding employment, she said. “In Washington County, we’ve really been seeing the aging population, and we’re really starting to see that in the area of homelessness,” she said.

The new shelter is a “symbol of bringing humanity back to our community,” Castillo said.

“Instead of just requiring our neighbors to pick them up by their bootstraps or work harder, this is really embracing the fact that these are our neighbors, these are our community members,” she said. “They’re down on hard times, and we need to wrap ourselves around them and help them, and that betters the whole community.”

Eligibility — and pets

People tour the Great Hall inside the new Washington County Emergency Housing Service Building in Stillwater. (Claudia Staut / Pioneer Press)

Residents will be referred to the shelter by the Washington County Homeless Outreach Services Team and must meet eligibility criteria, including being over 18, passing a criminal background check, no active substance use and agreeing to actively participate in a housing plan. Anyone accepted to the program must be physically present and unsheltered in Washington County for at least a night before their stay commences; no walk-ups will be allowed.

Stepping Stone Emergency Housing will staff the building around the clock; the annual operating amount for the shelter is $1.4 million.

Residents may stay with partners or family members — there are seven double rooms in the shelter. They also will be allowed to keep their pets on site, a feature that Commissioner Karla Bigham says is key.

“People will not separate from their pets, even to get assistance,” Bigham said. “It’s very important that if we’re going to help all people experiencing homelessness, that we need to make sure that they are together with their pets, so that they get those services, and they’re not choosing one or the other.”

Said Castillo: “The last thing we want to do is erode any of the natural connections or supports that they have. We never wanted to have people make a choice of losing something by coming here. We wanted to make sure that this was an added value to their lives.”

The shelter features a “trauma-informed design” to reduce stress and nurture healing, said Emily Timm, an architect at LHB.

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“We’ve incorporated a lot of natural light and natural materials like wood,” Timm said. “We used wood wainscoting in the lobby to generate a warm environment. We try to avoid triggering colors that might be too harsh, such as bright, bright reds and oranges that tend to be more triggering for some people, so we take that into consideration. We’ve used softer tones that are more neutral and calming and more natural.”

The two-story shelter includes laundry facilities on both levels. There also is a “hot box” room, or heat chamber, which can be heated to 140 degrees. Because clients could bring along bed bugs or lice from previous living arrangements, everything coming into the shelter — including outside donations — will be treated in the chamber upon arrival, Tripple said.

Heat treatments are effective because bed bugs and their eggs die when exposed to high temperatures, she said.

The University of Minnesota has removed the leader with its physicians group from a vice presidential role following the announcement last week that the group and Fairview Health Services reached a deal to fund the U’s medical school.

The University of Minnesota President’s Office informed Dr. Greg Beilman on Wednesday that his interim appointment as the vice president for clinical operations had been ended, according to a spokesperson with University of Minnesota Physicians, also known as M Physicians. Beilman will continue to serve as interim chief executive officer of M Physicians.

M Physicians is a nonprofit and is governed by its own board of directors. Last week the group came under strong criticism from university leadership after the announcement last week that it had reached a 10-year agreement with Fairview.

A previous deal between the U and Fairview is set to expire in 2026.

The university, in a statement Wednesday, said the move was in response to their concerns over the agreement. A resolution passed last week by the U’s Board of Regents condemned the deal which appeared to have been reached without input from U administration.

“The Board of Regents at its Nov. 13 meeting unanimously passed a resolution directing the University to address concerns resulting from the recent actions of M Physicians leadership involving individuals serving in dual roles at the University of Minnesota and M Physicians,” the statement said. “These personnel changes were in direct response to those concerns and will help ensure the integrity of ongoing negotiations between the University, M Physicians and Fairview Health Services.”

The resolution

The University Board of Regents last week passed a resolution in response to the agreement, saying the physicians group acted “unlawfully” in the matter. Regents said M Physicians, the 1,200-member group practice for the medical school, overstepped its authority in the matter.

The resolution called for the M Physicians to negotiate with the university on the issue. It further stated that “the University is now obligated to take actions that will sustain the eminence of the Medical School and to enable the University to meet the health needs of all Minnesotans.”

Fairiview, in their announcement last week, said it and M Physicians “have executed a binding agreement which includes a detailed term sheet and expect to complete a definitive agreement by the end of 2025.”

The deal was hailed by Attorney General Keith Ellison who had been pushing the U and Fairview to reach a deal before the 2026 deadline. In September, Ellison directed M Physicians officials to begin a direct negotiation process with Fairview, according to M Physicians.

Beilman to continue other roles at the U

Beilman began his role as interim vice president for clinical operations on July 1. He also was elected by the University of Minnesota Physicians Board of Directors as interim chief executive officer of M Physicians at the time.

Beilman will continue in his roles as professor of Surgery and the Owen H. and Sarah Davidson Wangensteen Chair of Surgical Research at the U’s Medical School and as a general surgeon with the Department of Surgery.

Minneapolis-based Fairview owns health care facilities on the university’s Twin Cities campus, including the teaching hospital for the medical school.

Talks to extend the partnership between the university and Fairview have been ongoing since February 2024, with the two trying to reach agreement on a new health care model. The U medical center, which educates some 70% of the doctors and nurses in Minnesota, was sold to Fairview in 1997.

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