Former Greene County Sheriff's Deputy Charged with Child Porn

jones_complaint.pdf (2.25 MB)SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – Tammy Dickinson, United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced today that a former Greene County, Mo., Sheriff’s Deputy has been charged in federal court with possessing child pornography.

Juan Jones, 27, of Springfield, Mo., was charged in a federal criminal complaint filed in the U.S. District Court in Springfield, Mo., on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2015. Jones remains in federal custody pending a detention hearing on Monday, Jan. 11, 2016.

The federal criminal complaint alleges that Jones was in possession of child pornography between Aug. 21, 2015, and Jan. 6, 2016.

According to an affidavit filed in support of the criminal complaint, law enforcement received a Cyber Tip that had originally been filed with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children by Dropbox, Inc. Dropbox is a file hosting service and online backup facility that offers cloud storage, file synchronization and client software.

Dropbox had discovered many video and image files that they believed contained child pornography. Investigators determined that Jones was connected to the account responsible for uploading those files to Dropbox. A search warrant was executed for the Dropbox account, which contained 168 video files and approximately 1,500 image files depicting child pornography. Some of the files depict children as young as infants being sexually abused by adult males.

A search warrant was executed on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, at Jones’s residence. While the warrant was being executed, law enforcement officers contacted Jones at his place of employment, the Greene County, Mo., Sheriff’s Department, and he was placed under arrest.

Dickinson cautioned that the charge contained in this complaint is simply an accusation, and not evidence of guilt. Evidence supporting the charge must be presented to a federal trial jury, whose duty is to determine guilt or innocence.

This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Ami Harshad Miller. The case was investigated solely by the Southwest Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force and the FBI.

Project Safe Childhood

This case 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. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc . For more information about Internet safety education, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc and click on the tab "resources."