Suspect arrested in child porn case
Garrett Warfield
A Maryville man was arrested Friday by a Nodaway County sheriff’s deputy on five felony counts of possession of child pornography filed June 3 by Prosecuting Attorney Robert Rice.
Garrett Warfield, 23, was being held in the Nodaway County jail in lieu of $100,000 bond. Sheriff Darren White said the suspect was expected to apply for representation by a public defender.
According to a probable cause statement submitted May 29 in Fourth District Circuit Court by Detective Sgt. Katherine Smith of the Platte County Sheriff’s Office/Western Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force, the charges against Warfield stem from an investigation that began in late January when Smith received Microsoft-generated CyberTipline reports from the Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Smith stated the tips revealed that about 50 images of naked male children between the approximate ages of 3 and 14 had been uploaded from an Internet protocol address, or IP, in Independence in the name of Lee Warfield, which the detective’s statement identifies as a parent of Garrett Warfield.
According to the probable cause statement, authorities subsequently discovered that Garrett Warfield was a student at Northwest Missouri State University residing in the 2500 block of Aurora Avenue in Maryville.
According to Northwest spokesman Mark Hornickel, Warfield has since withdrawn from the university.
After obtaining a warrant, Smith conducted a search of the Aurora Avenue address on March 10 and found two laptop computers, a Sony camera and four smartphones along with various external computer drives and other digital gear.
Smith reportedly interviewed Warfield after the suspect arrived at the scene and alleges that he admitted accidentally viewing child pornography.
After Warfield was placed in custody on a 24-hour investigative hold, Smith asserts that she searched one of the seized thumb drives and discovered more than 100 explicit images along with several pornographic videos involving male children and teenagers between the ages of 4 and 17.
The videos, Smith alleged, also contained scenes of adults and children committing various sexual acts together.
Following the initial investigation and interrogation, the seized materials were submitted to the Heart of America Regional Computer Forensics Laboratory in Kansas City for an analysis that was completed about three weeks ago.
Smith said a forensic examiner at the lab confirmed the existence of child pornography on the seized files, which led to the issuance of an arrest warrant by Fourth District Circuit Court in Nodaway County.
According to court records, Warfield was to appear in court for initial arraignment at 9 a.m. today before associate Circuit Judge Douglas Thomson. If ultimately convicted, Warfield could serve a term of between five and 15 years in state prison on each of the five counts.
The court case number is 15ND-CR00185.
