Great Falls Man Sentenced for Possession of Child Porn

GREAT FALLS  – Cassidy Winters, 29, of Great Falls was sentenced today to 28 months in prison and 10 years’ supervised release for possession of child pornography.  Winters will also be required to pay $12,500 in restitution for six victims.  Federal District Court Judge Brian M. Morris issued the sentence.

Winters was charged by superseding information on February 17, 2016.  In documents filed with the court, Assistant U.S. Attorney Cyndee Peterson stated that, if required to prove its case at trial, the government was prepared to introduce evidence that Winters possessed multiple files containing child pornography between December 2012 and May 2015.

In March 2015, agents for the U.S. Secret Service and the Montana Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force downloaded files from an IP address as part of an online investigation to identify individuals sharing child porn over the Internet using a peer to peer file sharing network.  They identified the registered subscriber of the IP address as Winters and obtained a search warrant for his home.

On May 27, 2015, agents served the warrant and seized several computers and digital devices from Winters’ bedroom.  The items were forensically analyzed and contained image and video files depicting children engaged in sexually explicit conduct.  The agents also recovered search terms connected to the software that indicated Winters had sought out known images and series of child pornography.  At the sentencing, a witness testified that Winters had engaged in this criminal conduct for five or six years.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Cyndee Peterson and investigated by the United States Secret Service, the Flathead County Sheriff’s Office, and the Montana Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force.