Whitesville Man on Supervised Release Pleads Guilty to Second Child Pornography Charge

CHARLESTON, W.Va. – A Whitesville man has pled guilty to possession of child pornography, announced United States Attorney Mike Stuart. Daniel Runion, 34, pled guilty in May 2019 to one count of possessing child pornography.

“Egregious. Runion has now been convicted of a second federal child pornography offense, as well as being a felon in possession of a firearm,” said United States Attorney Mike Stuart.  “I commend the law enforcement agencies involved and my team for protecting West Virginia children from Runion by securing these convictions.”

Runion admitted that he possessed child pornography on his smart phone while in Marmet, Kanawha County. The images showed a minor female performing oral sex on an adult male.  In connection with that activity, Runion also admitted that he sent a video of child pornography over Facebook to another user of the social media website.  At the time of the offense, Runion had been recently released from prison after serving a 97 month sentence and was currently serving his 15 year term of supervised release resulting from a 2012 federal conviction for receiving child pornography.

Today, the Court found Runion to be in violation of his supervised release and revoked his release.  Runion faces up to 20 years in prison when sentenced on June 22, 2020.  In a separate case, Runion pled guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm on October 29, 2019. He is awaiting sentencing on that charge, for which he faces up to 10 years in prison.

The West Virginia State Police and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) conducted the investigation.  Senior United States District Judge John T. Copenhaver, Jr. presided over the hearing. Assistant United States Attorney Kristin F. Scott is handling the prosecution.

This case was prosecuted as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative of the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States Attorney’s 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 those who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.

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