Jonesboro Man Sentenced to More Than 21 Years on Multiple Child Pornography Charges

LITTLE ROCK—Patrick C. Harris, Acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas, announced today that Steven Thorpe, 44, of Jonesboro, will spend more than 21 years in federal prison for advertising child pornography.

A federal grand jury indicted Thorpe on April 8, 2015, for one count of advertising child pornography and one count of possession of child pornography. On August 15, 2016, he pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography, and on February 9, 2017, he pleaded guilty to advertising child pornography.

Chief United States District Court Judge Brian S. Miller imposed the sentence of 262 months for both counts. There is no parole in the federal system. When Thorpe is released upon completion of his sentence, he will remain on supervised release for the rest of his life. Conditions of his supervised release include registering as a sex offender and having no contact with minors under the age of 18.

The investigation into Thorpe’s crimes began in June 2014, when two people brought Thorpe’s phone and computer to the Jonesboro Police Department and reported that they had seen sexually explicit photos of a minor on Thorpe’s phone. Jonesboro police obtained a search warrant, and when they searched the phone, investigators found over 20,000 images of child pornography.

The United States Secret Service then obtained a search warrant for Thorpe’s laptop computer, which contained over 1,400 images of child pornography. In addition to the photos of children being sexually abused, agents also discovered that Thorpe had accessed online chatrooms through a computer program called Gigatribe. In these chats, Thorpe advertised to other users that he had child pornography available, including “doctor/patient, dad/son, hidden cams, massage,” and “getting caught, locker/school rooms, and public videos.” Thorpe would then send other users a link to a folder containing his child pornography along with his password, “boys777.”

Thorpe is still facing multiple state charges, including pending sexual assault and additional possession of child pornography charges in Craighead County.

The case was investigated by the Jonesboro Police Department and United States Secret Service, and was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Allison W. Bragg and Kristin Bryant.