BANGOR – A Bucksport man was sentenced Monday to two years in federal prison for possession of child pornography.

Richard Francis Ames, 55, also was sentenced to three years of probation after his release and ordered to forfeit his computer.

“When you did what you did in this case, you sentenced yourself,” U.S. District Judge John Woodcock said. “I can think of no greater obligation I have as a judge than to protect our children from sexual and other predators.”

Ames was convicted in 1979 in Penobscot County Superior Court and sentenced to one year in jail, all suspended, and two years’ probation for unlawful sexual contact. Due to that sentence, he faced a mandatory minimum sentence of 24 months in U.S. District Court in Bangor on Monday.

The FBI began investigating Ames in April 2001 while he was living in Stella, N.C., after a computer repair firm found child pornography on his computer, according to court documents. At Ames’ home, investigators seized numerous items depicting children engaged in sexual activity, including three three-ring binders full of images of child pornography that Ames had downloaded, printed, cut out and put into the binders.

Ames admitted to collecting and transmitting child pornography. He also told investigators that he had been transmitting the images to a 13-year-old boy in California, according to the prosecution version of the crime.

Further investigation and the prosecution of Ames were delayed for nearly three years due to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, which occurred five months after the pornography was discovered on his computer, Assistant U.S. Attorney James McCarthy said Monday.

The case was moved to Maine after Ames was indicted earlier this year by a federal grand jury in North Carolina. Ames pleaded guilty to the charge in July in Bangor.