In Depth: Sentencing for Child Pornography Offenders

BRYAN, Texas (KBTX) - The vast majority of child pornography offenders are men, overwhelmingly white and usually college-educated with little to no criminal record, according to the FBI.

Advocates against child exploitation will also say the perpetrators who are producing, distributing or looking at child pornography are usually not strangers.

“The number of individuals that perpetrate on children, 99% of them are known by the child. It is your family friends, it is your family members who are abusing children,” said Cary Baker, Executive Director of Scotty’s House.

But what happens to these predators after they’re caught? According to the FBI, 99.1% of child pornography offenders are sentenced to prison.

In 2003, congress passed the PROTECT Act with the intent of preventing child abuse as well as investigating and prosecuting violent crimes against children. Within that law, congress increased the minimum sentence to five years for child pornography possession, 10 years for distribution and 15 years for production offenses.

The law also provided enhancements for using technology for producing, possessing or receiving child pornography, but a study conducted almost 20 years later showed those enhancements have not kept pace with technological advancements.

“Due to advancements in technology, enhancements that were only intended to apply to the most serious child pornography offenses were routinely applied to most non-production child pornography offenders,” a report from the United States Sentencing Commission said.

According to the report, in 2019, over 95% of non-production child pornography offenders received enhancements for using a computer.

“The use of the internet has increased the ability for predators to exploit children much more widely and much more often,” said Supervisory Special Agent for Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force Torrence White.

Even as arrests increase and enhancements are added to sentences, the average sentence is below the average guideline minimum, data from 2019 shows.

“Although the difference between the average guideline minimum and average sentence imposed has remained somewhat stable since fiscal year 2014, the long-term trend shows that most courts believe [the PROTECT Act] is generally too severe and does not appropriately measure offender culpability in the typical non-production child pornography case.”

Less than 30% of non-production child pornography offenders received a sentence within the guideline range in 2019. Charging practices, guideline ranges, and sentencing practices of judges all contributed to some degree to these disparities, according to the report.

To read the United States Sentencing Commission Report on non-production child pornography offenses, click here.

To read the United States Sentencing Commission Report on child pornography production offenses, click here.

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