A Fayetteville man was sentenced to an eight-year prison sentence Thursday after pleading guilty to downloading more than 10,000 images of child pornography, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Michael Billy Whitehead, 26, was arrested in February 2012 after police said they seized child pornography from his home computer. He pleaded guilty in December to one count of receiving child pornography, according to the office of Conner Eldridge, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Arkansas.
Whitehead was sentenced Thursday in federal court in Fayetteville.
In addition to a 97-month prison sentence, Judge Jimm Larry Hendren also sentenced Whitehead to 10 years of supervised release, according to Eldridge’s office.
Fayetteville police began investigating a lead in 2012 involving the distribution of child pornography via a peer-to-peer network. Investigators were able to trace trace an IP address associated with the network to Whitehead, leading police to seek and carry out a search warrant on Whitehead’s home, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
