Former City of Fond du Lac employee headed to jail two years after being sentenced

MADISON, Wis. (AP) - A former City of Fond du Lac human resources director convicted of viewing child pornography will soon go to jail more than two years after being sentenced.

The Fond du Lac Reporter reports that Circuit Court Judge Dale English on Friday ordered 60-year-old Benjamin W. Mercer to report to the county jail within 30 days.

In January 2008, English sentenced Mercer to eight years on probation and one year of jail with work release privileges on 14 counts of possession of child pornography.

A jury had convicted Mercer on counts involving images viewed on Mercer's human resources work computer.

Mercer appealed, arguing images must be stored in a hard drive to constitute possession but in March an appeals court ruled that viewing child pornography online is also possession. The state Supreme Court said in August it wouldn't hear the case.