HOPEWELL, Va. – A Virginia man has been sentenced after pleading guilty to having videos and photos of infants and toddlers being sexually abused.
Christopher Scott Ellis, 33, of Hopewell, will serve 7.5 years in prison, with an additional 137.5 years suspended. He has pleaded guilty to 15 counts of possession of child pornography.
When he gets out of prison, Ellis will be placed on a supervised release. He will not be allowed to use the internet or have contact with minors. He will also have to register as a sex offender.
Evidence presented in court showed that Ellis was identified by law enforcement after sharing files of child pornography with undercover investigators from the FBI Child Exploitation Task Force over a peer-to-peer file-sharing network in late 2014 through the summer of 2015.
In July 2015, task force officers executed a search on Ellis' residence and seized a number of computers from the home.
The computers had several thousand saved images and videos of child pornography, as well as file-sharing software. Many of these files featured infants and toddlers being sexually abused, as well as sadomasochistic and bestiality scenes involving children.
Some of the victims have been identified by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children as abuse victims in prior law enforcement investigations.