Ex-SC lawmaker pleads guilty to distributing child sex abuse material

COLUMBIA, S.C. (WIS) - A former South Carolina lawmaker, once eager for the attention of a recording camera, hid his face from them Monday as he left the federal courthouse in Columbia in an orange-and-white striped jumpsuit and shackled wrists.

Earlier that afternoon, Robert John May, better known as “RJ,” pleaded guilty to five counts of distributing child sex abuse material, which South Carolina’s top federal prosecutor described as “the worst of the worst” among the 10 counts May had faced.

Prosecutors will drop the other five in exchange for May’s plea.

After being arrested and indicted in June, May had been preparing for his trial to begin in just over a week, representing himself in court despite not having a law degree. His earlier attorney had suggested May was framed by his political enemies.

But following a hearing last week, he decided to plead guilty to half of the counts he would be facing at trial, after turning down prosecutors’ earlier offer to plead guilty to two of them.

“In pleading guilty, May waives his right to appeal and takes responsibility for his role in fueling a deprived and evil industry,” US Attorney for the District of South Carolina Bryan Stirling said Monday following the hearing.

May will be sentenced in January. Each count carries between five and 20 years in federal prison, which can be served consecutively or concurrently, along with a maximum $250,000 fine and a minimum five-year supervised release, which could last for life. May will also be required to pay $40,000 in restitution to funds that assist victims of trafficking and child sex abuse.

He will have to register as a sex offender, and the ex-legislator will lose certain rights by being convicted of federal felonies, including his rights to vote, own a firearm and hold elected office.

The former Republican representative from Lexington County was suspended from his elected office right after he was indicted in June, and he resigned from his seat about two months after that.

During his hearing Monday, May admitted that while he was a sitting state lawmaker, he knowingly sent videos containing child sex abuse material to other users of the online app Kik in April of last year and that he used aliases, including “joebidennnn69,” to do it.

“It’s a priority for the Department of Justice to protect children and take down pedophiles like Robert John May. This heartbreaking case is not victimless. These files are shared over and over again,” Stirling said. “Every download revictimizes these children and fuels this evil industry.”

Prosecutors claimed May actually sent nearly 500 explicit videos over a five-day period from late March to early April of 2024, but the five to which he has now pleaded guilty are among the most heinous and disturbing.

They alleged the explicit videos were shared with users in 18 states and six countries.

“There’s relevant conduct considered in federal sentencing, so the counts that do get dismissed are still considered and held against him. So we didn’t feel the sentence would be any substantively different, whether it was five counts or 10 counts,” Assistant US Attorney Scott Matthews, the lead prosecutor in May’s case, said.

Investigators said they did not find any child sex abuse material on May’s devices, including his phones, laptop and hard drives. But according to a memo filed by federal prosecutors, Kik compiled data from May’s alleged account in July 2024, with content containing 265 videos depicting child sexual abuse material. The data also showed May’s account allegedly sent or received nearly 1,150 messages with other Kik users over the five-day period his account existed, with some discussing trading child sexual abuse material.

Kik’s data also included IP addresses from each message that was sent, with May’s account being used at his home’s Wi-Fi network 958 times.

“Agents confirmed during surveillance of the residence, and again during the search of the residence. that the Wi-Fi at the May residence was password protected,” May’s indictment read in part. “Thus, for the CSAM activity on Kik to have been conducted by someone other than May, that person would have had to know the Wi-Fi password.”

Activity on the account was also accessed via a virtual private network as well as a Verizon Wireless account, per documents.

Documents also stated that a forensic analysis of May’s phone showed he deleted Kik as well as other apps Telegram, Mega and Loki Messenger, within seconds of each other in April 2024. It also showed May allegedly used Kik to discuss the use of Telegram and Messenger, which prosecutors noted “both of which are applications that have frequently been used by individuals engaged in CSAM activity due to their encryption and foreign ownership.”

The memo stated May’s Mega account was registered to the name “Eric Rentling,” which was an alias he allegedly used to create a Facebook account in that name. Investigators found the photo associated with the Facebook account “appears to be a picture of the back of May’s head.” May admitted to using the “Eric Rentling” alias during his hearing Monday.

Investigators also found the Eric Rentling account had conversations in Spanish with women from Colombia that “consisted largely of arranging ‘meet up’ dates, time, price negotiations and rules regarding the videoing of sexual encounters, all of which are indicative of sex work.” May would also allegedly conduct Facebook searches on South Carolina political candidates while on the Eric Rentling account, including those of his most recent primary opponent.

The memo further stated May’s activity on Kik revealed “he has a sexual interest in children the same age as his own children” and that he has “a sexual interest in incest” between young children and their parents.

“May engaged in this behavior on his cell phone and from his own home on multiple occasions, presumably without his wife’s knowledge,” the memo read. “If he can hide this criminal activity from the person he shares a bedroom with, then he can easily hide it from any court enforcement mechanism. Furthermore, there is evidence that he has recently traveled to South America to engage in commercial sex, again presumably without his wife’s knowledge that he ever even left the country. Thus, he is very likely to be able to evade detection by court enforcement of release conditions.”

May has been detained at the Edgefield County jail since his indictment in June, after a federal magistrate refused to grant bond to the father of two, citing the weight of evidence against him and the danger she believed he posed to his children and others.

He will remain at the jail until his sentencing.

May, 38, had represented part of Lexington County at the State House since 2021 before his resignation in August.

He was most recently re-elected in November 2024, about three months after federal investigators raided his home and seized nearly three dozen electronic devices, including cellphones, hard drives and thumb drives. By the election, the search of May’s property had become public knowledge.

He rose to prominence in Columbia as a founding member of the hardline conservative South Carolina Freedom Caucus, which has been part of the effort to push the Republican Party in South Carolina further to the right.

The Lexington County representative spearheaded the group’s strategy during its early years as it frequently clashed with members of the larger House Republican Caucus, serving as vice chair of the Freedom Caucus until mid-2024, when the group elected new leadership.

May was marked present every day of this year’s legislative session, which began in January and ended in early May. However, the once-vocal member remained silent during debates on the House floor, largely staying seated at his back-corner desk throughout the year.

“The people of District 88 elected me to do a job, and that’s what I’m here to do,” May said during a House reorganizational session Dec. 3, in response to reporters’ questions about the investigation and upcoming session. “The people elected me to do a job, and I’ll continue to do the job I’ve done for the last four years.”

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