A Clinton man was sentenced Friday to 20 years in prison -- with no parole -- for taking sexually explicit photographs of a young girl and sharing them on the Internet.
Nicholas DeRose, 44, was arrested after U.S. Department of Homeland Security agents found a file-sharing profile online on Aug. 2, 2013, and then traced the Internet Protocol address to DeRose's Clinton home, for which they obtained a search warrant Jan. 27, 2014.
DeRose admitted that he sent and received images containing child pornography and that he was the person who used a hidden camera to take photographs of the girl, who was between the ages of 12 and 16, while she used the bathroom and slept, according to a news release.
In the news release, U.S. Attorney Christopher Thyer in Little Rock and Raymond R. Parmer Jr., special agent in charge of the Homeland Security Investigations office in New Orleans, said DeRose told agents that he had purchased a small, battery-powered camera from a "spy shop" in Little Rock.
They said he admitted to drilling a hole in the handle of a plastic toilet plunger and hiding the camera in the handle to record the girl. He told agents that he would later retrieve the camera and a small memory card inside it that had saved the video, and then he would transfer the video to his laptop computer.
DeRose was indicted June 4, 2014. He pleaded guilty July 10, 2015, to a charge of sexual exploitation of a child in return for a second charge of producing child pornography being dropped.
In addition to the 240-month sentence, Chief U.S. District Judge Brian Miller imposed a 10-year term of supervised release, during which DeRose must register as a sex offender and have no contact with anyone younger than 18 years old.
Thyer said the sentence "cannot undo the irreparable harm committed by DeRose," but it "sends the message that law enforcement will find those who exploit the most vulnerable victims in our society and send them to prison for decades."
Parmer said child-pornography cases "will continue to be one of the agency's highest priorities."
Metro on 01/30/2016