BOISE - Mark Eugene Timperley, 20, of Indianapolis, Indiana, pleaded guilty yesterday in the United States District Court to possession of child pornography, Acting U.S. Attorney Rafael Gonzalez announced.
According to the plea agreement, in February of 2017, a school resource officer with the Nampa Police Department was informed that a 14-year-old Nampa student was in an internet relationship with Timperley, and that Timperley planned to come to Idaho to live with the student. Nampa officers looked at the victim’s cell phone and saw text messages between Timperley and the victim where Timperley asked for and received images of the victim engaged in sexually explicit conduct.
Three days later, Nampa detectives met with Timperley in Boise after he got off a Greyhound bus. Timperley told the detectives that he was in an online relationship with the victim, that he knew the victim was 14 years old, and that he asked for and received sexually explicit images from the victim. The detectives took Timperley’s cell phone, examined its contents, and found approximately 46 explicit images of the victim.
Sentencing is set for Nov. 20, 2017, before Chief U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill. Possession of child pornography is punishable by up to 10 years imprisonment, a $250,000 fine, a term of supervised release of not less than five years and up to life, and a $5,100 special assessment. As part of his plea, Timperley also agreed to forfeit his cell phone used in the commission of the offense.
The case was investigated by the Nampa Police Department, Homeland Security Investigations, and the Canyon County Prosecutor’s Office. The 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."
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
