Name: Terry W. James
Case: United States v. James No. 00-0592
Date Of Conviction: July 13, 1998
Date: Argued February 6, 2001
Date: Decided August 15, 2001
Plea: Guilty
Charges: Distributing And Possessing Child Pornography
Military Branch: U.S. Navy
Listed In National Sex Offenders Registry? NO
The record of trial shows that during 1998, appellant served aboard the USS FRANK CABLE (AS 40), stationed at Guam. Appellant lived in government quarters with another person, M.H. The roommate owned a personal computer and paid monthly fees for Internet access through a commercial provider. He also allowed appellant to use both the computer and the Internet account.
From February to April 1998, appellant used the roommate’s Internet account to "swap" files by downloading pictures from an Internet site in exchange for posting pictures to that same site. Appellant "intentionally picked sites . . . advertis[ing] ‘pre-teen pics’ and downloaded" at least three files that contained "pictures of minors engaged in explicit sexual activity. After downloading" these files, "appellant viewed" the pictures "and saved" the images onto his roommate’s computer.
On April 22, 1998, appellant entered a chat room offering a conversation on "Dad and daughter sex." While accessing the chat room through his roommate’s account, appellant engaged in a discussion with someone called "Fast Girl," in fact the screen name of a male agent of the U.S. Customs Service posing as a female pedophile. "[A]t Fast Girl’s request, appellant uploaded a picture of a child he believed to be a minor engaged in sexually explicit activity" and sent the picture electronically to Fast Girl. "Two days later, . . . appellant uploaded" another fifteen pictures which he "believed" were "minors engaged in sexually explicit activity" and sent them electronically to Fast Girl. The agent posing as Fast Girl received all the pictures back in continental United States. 53 MJ at 612-13.
Appellant admitted the above facts and pleaded guilty to violating 18 USC § 2252A on at least three occasions.
On July 13, 1998, appellant was tried by a military judge sitting alone at a special court-martial at the U.S. Trial Service Office Guam. Pursuant to his pleas, he was found guilty of one specification of possessing child pornography and two specifications of transporting child pornography in interstate commerce, in violation of 18 USC § 2252A as assimilated by Article 134, Uniform Code of Military Justice, 10 USC § 934. The military judge sentenced appellant to a bad-conduct discharge, confinement for 150 days, and reduction to pay grade E-1. On March 8, 1999, the convening authority approved the sentence as adjudged, and on May 19, 2000, the Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the findings and sentence.
Appellant’s admissions concerning the age of the subjects of the pictures in his case were amply supported by the pictures themselves which are attached to this record as exhibits. See R. 54-55 and Pros. Ex. 2-4. In addition he admitted that he went to various web sites looking for pictures of "pre-teen[s]" and downloaded pictures from files labeled in a manner reasonably suggesting depiction of actual minors. R. 26, 38. Finally, appellant admitted that he visited chat rooms on the Internet with topics such as "Dad and daughter sex" where pictures of minors were regularly requested and provided. R. 32. Viewed in its entirety, we conclude that the factual circumstances reflected in the record "objectively support" appellant’s guilty pleas to possessing and transporting child pornography depicting actual minors.
United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, Argued February 6, 2001
Decided August 15, 2001. The decision of the United States Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals is affirmed.
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Conviction Records
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Terry W. James
Machinist’s Mate First Class - U.S. Navy
Convicted Sex Offender
Distributing Child Pornography
