(From the U. S. Attorney for the Western District of Missouri)A Springfield, Mo., man who is a prior sex offender was sentenced in federal court yesterday for receiving and distributing child pornography within an online group.
Anthony P. Thuro, 41, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge M. Douglas Harpool to 17 years in federal prison without parole, to be followed by a 25-year term of supervised release.
On June 5, 2023, Thuro pleaded guilty to receiving and distributing child pornography. Thuro, a registered sex offender, has two prior felony convictions for statutory sodomy (involving 7-year-old and 13-year-old victims). The court also sentenced Thuro to spend the rest of his life on supervised release following incarceration.
During a law enforcement investigation, the FBI discovered that a user distributed a Mega folder containing 13.7 gigabytes of data, which included numerous videos of child sexual abuse material, to a Kik group. The Mega folder was traced back to Thuro, and IP addresses indicated that Thuro accessed the Mega folder multiple times. According to court documents, those videos in the Mega included depictions of toddlers being sexually abused, prepubescent children subjected to sexual abuse and bondage, and prepubescent children subjected to bestiality.
On Aug. 30, 2022, law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Thuro’s residence. They seized Thuro’s cell phone, which contained evidence he had accessed the Mega and Kik applications in the past. Investigators also found 36 images of child sexual abuse material that were cached in the gallery application of the phone.
This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephanie L. Wan. It was investigated by the FBI, Homeland Security Investigations, the Greene County, Mo., Sheriff’s Department, the Springfield, Mo., Police Department, and the Southwest Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force.
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