Cheyenne man sentenced for possession of child porn

A Cheyenne, Wyoming man was sentenced Tuesday for possessing what prosecutors call the largest collection of child pornography in the United States.

Richard Patrick Person, 63, was sentenced to 19.5 years in prison followed by ten years of supervised release. U.S. Diistrict Court Judge Nancy Freudenthal also ordered Person to pay $5,000 in restitution for possession of child pornography.

U.S. Attorney Christopher A. Crofts said the Wyoming Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force used state of the art investigative techniques to discover a sophisticated file sharing program that was used to seek out and possess child pornography.

A search warrant of Person’s South Cheyenne residence seized several computers and numerous electronic storage devices. The seized computers had approximately 47 terabytes of storage capacity. The files included both movies and still images.

One terabyte holds approximately 1,000 hours of standard definition video or approximately 310,000 photos.

Lead Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation (WDCI) Special Agent Mark Timmons expended over 400 hours analyzing the child porn in Person’s possession.

Timmons submitted approximately 10 million files he believes depict children engaged in sexually explicit conduct to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC). He said he had another 7 million files that he is getting ready to ship off for analysis.

According to the NCMEC and National Internet Crimes Against Children this is the largest cache of child pornography ever seized in the United States.

Person had one prior conviction for sexual assault on a child.