A Valley Grande man has been sentenced to 20 years in prison after pleading guilty to sexually abusing a child, according to Dallas County District Attorney Michael Jackson.

Christopher Scott Hobson pleaded guilty last week, Jackson said. Hobson, who was 32 years old at the time, was arrested and charged with first-degree sodomy and sexual abuse of a child under the age of 12 in January 2017. Hobson turned himself in at the Dallas County Jail.

He was sentenced by Circuit Judge Collins Pettaway.

“We are going to keep cracking down on child molesters,” Jackson said. “He also has to register as a sex offender.”

According to Cpt. Mike Granthum with the Dallas County Sheriff’s Department, Hobson sexually abused a young boy for a few years before the child told his family.

“We found out that it started several years ago, approximately three to five years ago,” Granthum said in a January 2017 interview. “The child was even younger at the time. The child got to the age where he could determine right from wrong on his own, and he came forward.”

The child was reportedly a friend of the family. Hobson is a former first responder, but he was not in law enforcement.