BRENHAM MAN SENTENCED TO 30 YEARS IN PRISON FOR CHILD PORNOGRAPHY

  

A Brenham man will be spending the next 30 years in prison after being sentenced in the Brazos County District Court on Child Pornography charges.

27-year-old Preston Smith, who was a student at Texas A&M at the time of his arrest, was charged with three counts of Possession of Child Pornography. 

District Court Judge John Brick sentenced Smith to 10 years in prison for each count, and stipulated that the sentences will run consecutively.

According to the Brazos County District Attorney’s Office, the case began in March 2020. The Office of the Texas Attorney General was notified by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children that child pornography was being uploaded into a Dropbox account.

An investigator with the Attorney General’s Office, was able to link the Dropbox account to the defendant.

A search warrant was executed at Smith’s apartment, where his computers and digital devices were seized.

Following the seizure, Smith was interviewed by the AG Investigator, where he admitted to seeking out child pornography and trading child pornography with others on-line.

During the punishment hearing, Ken Sikes, a digital forensic investigator with the Brazos County District Attorney’s Office, testified to finding over 2,000 sexually deviant and explicit images and videos on the computers and digital devices.

He added that downloading had been going on since 2016.

Two defense witnesses testified that Smith has Bi-Polar Disorder, and now that he has been treated, he is at low risk to re-offend.

Judge Brick cited his concerns for the safety of the children in the community and the horrifying nature of the images and videos as his reason for issuing the maximum sentence in the case.