Pocatello man sentenced to more than 19 years for receipt of child pornography

POCATELLO, Idaho (KIFI/KIDK) – A 42-year-old Pocatello man was sentenced in U.S. District Court to 235 months in federal prison for receiving sexually explicit images of minors, U.S. Attorney Bart M. Davis announced Tuesday.

Senior Ninth Circuit Judge N. Randy Smith, sitting as a U.S. District Court judge, also ordered Carlos Brewer serve a lifetime of supervised release following his prison sentence.

Brewer pleaded guilty to the charge on January 6, 2020.

According to court records, in August 2019, law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Brewer’s Pocatello home. Officers previously received information that Brewer possessed a thumb drive containing child pornography. At the home, Brewer informed officers that the thumb drive was located in his messenger bag and he admitted that he previously transferred child pornography to the thumb drive from images on his computer. During a forensic search of Brewer’s devices, officers found hundreds of images of child pornography. Brewer admitted in court that he received the child pornography by downloading it to his computer.

At sentencing, Judge Smith also ordered Brewer to forfeit the computer and thumb drive used in the commission of the offense. As a result of his conviction, Brewer will be required to register as a sex offender.

This case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations in Idaho Falls and U.S. Probation and Pretrial Services, and was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims.