THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, December 21, 1995 TAG: 9512210346
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B6 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JOE JACKSON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Short : 45 lines
A Chesapeake man pleaded guilty in federal court Wednesday to two counts of receiving and possessing child pornography.
In November, a federal grand jury indicted Howard C. Guthrie for receipt of materials involving the sexual exploitation of minors and possession of such materials. He faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in federal prison without parole and $500,000 in fines.
Guthrie was arrested in early October as the result of a nationwide sting operation, testimony showed.
In June 1994, U.S. postal inspectors in San Diego searched the offices of Overseas Mail, a mail-order business specializing in videos of boys, ages 7 to 15, engaged in sexual acts. Postal inspectors arrested the owner, James Kemmish, whose charges are still pending in court. They also seized a mailing list with the names of 300 to 400 customers, authorities said.
Guthrie was on this list, prosecutors said.
In July federal agents started the sting. They wrote letters to people on the mailing list, saying that the business had changed hands and was now called Island Mail, testimony showed. They advertised their videos as ``male entertainment'' featuring ``hot lads'' and cataloged the videos according to age group: ages 7 to 11; 12 to 15; and 16 to 21.
On Sept. 25, Guthrie sent a $213 check to Island Mail for two videos of boys, ages 6 to 15, engaged in sex, testimony showed. On Oct. 4, an agent delivered the tapes to Guthrie's home in Chesapeake, where he lived with his mother.
Soon afterward, agents searched the house, where they found the two tapes plus seven others depicting child pornography, testimony showed.
Over the past two or three years, there have been few federal indictments like Guthrie's in local federal courts since most of the investigations have centered on child pornography on computer networks, authorities said.
Guthrie will be sentenced on March 21.
KEYWORDS: ARREST TRIAL VERDICT CHILD
PORNOGRAPHY by CNB