A Florissant, Missouri man has been sentenced to over 14 years in prison after pleading guilty to a child pornography charge. U.S. District Judge Henry E. Autrey sentenced Patrick Neistat, 24, to 170 months in prison on Thursday.
Neistat admitted to one count of receipt of child pornography in October. He acknowledged possessing images and videos depicting child sexual abuse on multiple cell phones.
The case began on September 8, 2022, when detectives from the St. Louis County Police Department received an urgent tip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC). The tip indicated that a user of the Skout social media platform had uploaded several images showing the sexual abuse of a minor. Investigators traced the account to Neistat’s residence. Although he initially denied owning a phone, police later found and seized his device.
According to court documents, one phone contained 123 images and four videos of child pornography, as well as 187 images and 18 videos categorized as “age difficult” pornography and 634 computer-generated or animated images depicting children in sexual acts. The plea agreement also states that Neistat possessed videos of himself engaging in inappropriate conduct with a five-year-old child. A second phone held twelve more images containing illegal material along with sexually explicit conversations and photos exchanged with a twelve-year-old girl and an apparent fourteen-year-old girl.
The FBI worked alongside local police during the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Hayes prosecuted the case.
“This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice,” according to information provided by authorities. “Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Department of Justice Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims.” Additional details about Project Safe Childhood are available at www.justice.gov/psc.
