Huston Huddleston, CEO of New Starship Foundation LLC and the man behind the rescue and restoration of the exhibitor’s version of  Enterprise bridge set from Star Trek: The Next Generation, has been arrested on three counts related to child pornography. The accusation arise from an alleged series of encounters with an underage girl on or around September 1, 2013.

Huddleston was arrested March 24, 2018 on three charges, all related to possession of child pornography, enticing a minor to participate in it, and intent to commit a felony with a minor. His first court date was on June 12, 2018, where bail was set at $750,000. A second court date is set for June 20, at which the jury trial will commence. Huddleston has plead “not guilty” to all three charges.

The news had originally come to light in the form of a Facebook post from one of the former volunteers for the Hollywood Science Fiction and Horror Museums, both projects of New Starship Foundation LLC, dated May 21, from the page of a woman identifying herself as Loretta Lightningbolt. Her post reads:

On behalf of the former volunteers of the planned Hollywood Sci-Fi Museum and Hollywood Horror Museum:

Earlier this evening we discovered through our own research that museum founder Floyd “Huston” Huddleston was not on a long vacation, as we had been told back in April.

We were sickened to discover he has been charged with three counts of sexual crimes against a minor, something none of us want any association with and therefore we have resigned from our respective positions.

We thank you for your understanding.

Sincerely,

Loretta Lightningbolt
Christine Rideout
Lauren Wist Vorbeck
Freddie Lechuga
Sherry Fruge
Jessika Lange
István C Kolnhofer
Jeri Klein

The timing of the event is interesting at least.

April 5, 2013 is when New Starship Foundation LLC got its state non-profit papers, so all of this happened around the same time.

By September 13, 2013, New Starship LLC was already in trouble. An attorney representing the volunteers who worked with the beleagured 501(c)3 filed a memorandum with the board of directors.

September 1, 2013 is the date of the events specified in the accusation.

New Starship was registered as a 501(c)3 charity organization, A letter was sent to the foundation’s board of directors, addressing serious reservations the board had at the time about Huddleston’s handling of the foundation’s resources, including a mention that he had spent the foundation’s cash reserves to the point that the accounts were overdrawn:

The “bubbleship” from Oblivion, photographed here at Wonder Con 2013, part of the Hollywood Sci-Fi Museum collection.

Huddleston had run a series of successful Kickstarters, raising tens of thousands of dollars for the purpose first of restoring the bridge set, then for the founding of the Hollywood Sci-Fi Museum and Hollywood Horror Museum. No museum was ever opened to the public, despite Huddleston collecting props, set pieces and other memorabilia whose value may be in the millions of dollars.

Claims of mismanagement and misrepresentation haunt New Starship.

Brian Uiga, who worked with the volunteers for the organization, said this:

“I worked on the set itself at the beginning with a team I put together until we got fed up and left in 2013. The lawyer’s name who drafted the letter to the board to see if we could protect the set from constant damage is “Daniel Watts”.

“… My era of volunteers sent it [the memorandum written by Daniel Watson] to the board in 2013 to try and salvage the bridge management by contacting the board members responsible according to the IRS nonprofit incorporation documents. Our lawyer was contacted by one board member asking ‘how they got his information’ because ‘he never agreed to be a part of this’.”

Huddleston had also been working on a pornography documentary, and had interviewed porn actresses at a California-based convention. A volunteer for the project, who asked not to be named, said it looked very unprofessional and it was focused on choking fetishes.

Update

On June 20, 2018, Floyd Huston Huddleston pled guilty to one charge of possession of child pornography. The remaining charges,  enticing a minor to participate in child pornography, and intent to commit a felony with a minor, were dismissed. Huddleston must now serve three years of probation, must complete a 52 week sex offender counseling program, and is subject to search and seizure by any probation or other peace officer, with or without a warrant, probable cause or reasonable suspicion. He must also provide proof of registration as a sex offender to the court by September 19, 2018.

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SCIFI Radio Staff
SCIFI Radio Staff

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