October 27, 2017 -- A 75-year-old man in the U.S. state of California was sentenced to 330 years to life in prison for molesting children, the Tulare County District Attorney's Office said Wednesday.

According to the office's press release, Alex Lopez, who lived in Visalia, 340 km north of Los Angeles, was found guilty of 22 counts of lewd act upon a child under the age of 14.

Lopez committed lewd acts on four girls and a boy over a nearly 16-year period from July 1993 to May 2009, involving multiple victims who were 10 or younger.

"I am proud of the Crimes against Children Division for securing justice for families who suffered at the hands of this heinous offender," District Attorney Tim Ward said in the press release. "Nothing hurts a community more than a crime against a child."

Child molestation is a form of child abuse in which an adult or older adolescent uses a child for sexual stimulation. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reported in 2005 the administration received 83,600 substantiated reports of sexually abused children that year.