TEXARKANA -- A Broken Bow, Okla., man pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to charges of transporting child pornography.
Patrick Kellam, 42, appeared with Texarkana lawyer John Pickett for a plea hearing Thursday morning before U.S. District Judge Susan Hickey in Texarkana's downtown federal building. Kellam lived in Ashdown, and he took images of child pornography with him when he moved across the state line to Broken Bow in June 2013, Assistant U.S. Attorney David Ferguson said.
Officials with the Arkansas State Police were notified by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children that in the first few months of 2013, Kellam had attempted to upload images of child pornography to a cloud-based storage service using his Verizon cellphone account and Yahoo email account from an Internet address in Arkansas.
The center received 25 other notifications of similar uploading attempts by Kellam from Verizon, Google and Synchronoss Technologies, Ferguson said.
Homeland Security Department investigators determined that Kellam had moved from Arkansas to Oklahoma and interviewed him at his home in Broken Bow in June 2015, according to a plea agreement. Kellam admitted he had been accessing images of child pornography for some time and that "he knew it was wrong," the agreement said.
"Kellam said the images were of minors of all ages, including some infants, and he had last downloaded images a couple of days ago," the plea agreement said.
Kellam agreed to allow investigators access to his cellphone, tablet and laptop computer, all of which contained images of child pornography, the plea agreement said. Of the 67 images depicting children in sexually exploitative situations, at least one showed a prepubescent girl between the ages of 6 and 9 being sexually assaulted, according to the plea agreement.
Kellam's plea agreement includes his forfeiture of all the electronic devices on which he kept the offending images of children. Kellam also must register as a sex offender.
Transporting child pornography is punishable by five to 20 years in federal prison and a fine of up to $250,000.
Kellam is free on $5,000 bond and has been wearing an electronic monitor since he was released after a detention hearing March 29. Hickey said because Kellam has complied with the conditions of his pretrial release, she would allow him to remain free under the supervision of probation officials until his sentencing.
Once the court has received an investigation report that includes a recommendation for punishment under federal guidelines, a date for Kellam's sentencing will be set.
If any of the children in the images Kellam transported have been identified, Kellam could be ordered to pay restitution meant to help the victims deal with their physical and emotional suffering. The issue of restitution will be addressed at Kellam's sentencing hearing.
Metro on 06/04/2016