EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. (AP) — A top federal prosecutor Tuesday insisted a former All-America running back who filmed sex with a 13-year-old girl deserved a 30-year prison term he got despite claims by the man's attorney that the federal case was unconstitutional and would be appealed.

Charles Stegmeyer said he plans to ask the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals this week to throw out the federal sentence handed Friday to Steven Ballinger, arguing the case illegally mirrored one that produced an earlier probation sentence against Ballinger in state court.

Stegmeyer pressed that the U.S. government's case ran afoul of the constitutional provision against "double jeopardy," or being brought to trial twice on the same charges for the same offense. Stegmeyer said federal prosecutors, unsatisfied with the probation Ballinger received in state court, unfairly "got another bite at the apple" by seeking a harsher sentence.

"It flies in the face of double jeopardy. It's a slippery slope," Stegmeyer said after Steven Wigginton, southern Illinois' top U.S. attorney, issued a news release earlier in the day saying Ballinger got "a tough but fair sentence for a crime which obliterated the childhood of a minor victim."

Ballinger, 31, pleaded guilty in March in federal court, admitting that in mid-2006 he videotaped himself having sex with a girl on her 13th birthday. In 2009, Ballinger got 2 1/2 years of probation after pleading guilty to St. Clair County charges of child pornography and criminal sexual abuse involving the filmed sex with the same girl.

As part of a deal with Ballinger, state prosecutors dropped two counts of predatory criminal sexual assault and a charge that Ballinger possessed cocaine investigators found in his home.

Chief U.S. District Judge David Herndon, who during last week's daylong sentencing hearing also ordered Ballinger to spend 15 years on post-prison release, again rejected Stegmeyer's push to have the federal case tossed.

Herndon ruled that the request by the former football standout at MacMurray College in Jacksonville in west-central Illinois was not filed soon enough and that the Constitution's "double jeopardy" clause does not bar successive prosecutions by state or federal prosecutors.

Police have said Ballinger's inappropriate conduct with the girl surfaced in 2006, when the girl's mother became aware her daughter had established a sexual relationship with Ballinger and warned Ballinger that the girl was pre-teen. Federal prosecutors said Tuesday evidence during last week's sentencing hearing revealed that Ballinger gave the girl cocaine and alcohol during their relationship, later forcing the child to undergo rehab.

Police found the girl with Ballinger in July 2007 and arrested him on outstanding warrants related to a 2005 disorderly conduct charge and a traffic violation.

"In destroying the innocence of this victim, Mr. Ballinger destroyed his own future as well," Wigginton said. "This was a tough but fair sentence for a crime which obliterated the childhood of a minor victim, committed by an apparent serial abuser of women and children. Harsh punishment is demanded for persons like Mr. Ballinger, who victimize and scar our children."

Wigginton said evidence offered up to Herndon at sentencing showed Ballinger had a history of sexual assaults dating to 1998, when Ballinger, then 17, assaulted a 15-year-old girl who refused his romantic advances on school property. Ballinger later pleaded guilty in that case to battery; his sentence was not immediately available Tuesday.

Prosecutors on Friday also noted that Ballinger was 18 in November 1998 when he was accused of raping a 14-year-old girl, nearly six years later, in September 2004, he allegedly sexually assaulted a 17-year-old girl. Wigginton said neither of those cases was prosecuted "for various reasons."

Prosecutors also argued Friday that "various individuals who were familiar with Ballinger agreed that he was a danger to society and at a high risk to re-offend in the future."

Ballinger held the career rushing record at MacMurray College, where he was a Division II All-America selection in 2001 and 2002.


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