Henrico man sentenced to 5 years for solicitation of minors, possession of child pornography
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A 23-year-old Henrico man received a five-year jail sentence in Henrico Circuit Court last week after pleading guilty to five counts of using a communications system to solicit a minor and five counts of possession of child pornography.
David Williams was sentenced by Henrico Circuit Court Judge John Marshall.
Upon his release, Williams will be placed on supervised probation and required to register as a sex offender in any jurisdiction where he lives or works.
“Individuals like this who take advantage of children, rob them of their innocence, and exploit them must be brought to justice and held accountable for their actions,” said Virginia Attorney General mark Herring. “I’m glad my team was able to secure this strong sentence that will take this dangerous individual off of our streets and out of our communities, making our children safer. I want to thank our local, state, and federal partners for their help and dedication on this case.”
This case began when the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children located in Alexandria, Virginia received a tip that an individual had uploaded suspected child pornography into an email account. The account was subsequently identified as belonging to David Williams.
Separately around the same time, an Aurora County, Colorado police detective examined a cell phone as part of a child pornography investigation and recovered an online chat between a Colorado suspect and David Williams where they discussed trading child pornography.
Subsequently, in an interview with officers, Williams admitted to possessing child pornography. A forensic examination of Williams’ cell phone revealed that he had saved approximately 500 child pornography images. Also recovered from the phone were chats between Williams and minor boys where Williams sent them nude pictures of himself and requested that the minors send him sexually explicit images and engage in sex acts.
This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Child Exploitation Task Force and prosecuted by Assistant Attorney General Alexaundra Williams of Herring’s Computer Crimes Section, with assistance from the Henrico County Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office.
