Man Gets 19 Years for Child Porn Charges

A Wichita, Kan., man was sentenced to 19 years in prison Tuesday after sharing child pornography videos in a Yahoo chat room, the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) said.

Steven C. Perrine, 53, was sentenced in U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas. He was convicted in June on one count of distributing child pornography, one count of receiving child pornography, one count of possessing child pornography and one count of unlawfully possessing a firearm after a felony conviction.

Perrine was on probation for a prior conviction for the sexual exploitation of a minor when he was arrested in this case, U.S. Attorney Eric Melgren of the District of Kansas said in a press release.

Law enforcement officers found seven computer hard drives containing “thousands” of images containing child pornography during a search of Perrine’s home, Melgren said.

Perrine played videos containing child pornography to another Yahoo user in a chat room in September 2005, the DoJ said. The second user, located in Pennsylvania, alerted police there, and investigators tracked the videos to Perrine, the DoJ said.

On Dec. 22, investigators served a search warrant at Perrine’s home, where they seized firearms as well as two computers containing images of child pornography, the DoJ said.

Perrine pleaded guilty on Oct. 14, 2003, to the sexual exploitation of a child charge.

By Grant Gross, IDG News Service (Washington Bureau)

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