Registered Sex Offender Pleads Guilty To Possession Of Child Pornography
Friday, May 9, 2025, 11:45 A.M. ET. 2 Minute Read, By Art Fletcher: Englebrook Independent News,
CHARLESTON, W.VA.- A 48-year-old registered sex offender, previously convicted in 2007 of receiving child pornography, is facing up to 20 years in federal prison after pleading guilty on Wednesday to a federal child pornography charge.
On Wednesday, May 7, 2025, Robert M. Harvey, 48, a registered sex offender currently in federal custody, appeared in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia and pleaded guilty before U.S. District Court Judge Thomas E. Johnston to one count of Possession of Child Pornography.
Following entering his guilty plea on Wednesday, Judge Johnston accepted the plea and scheduled sentencing for August 25, 2025. At that time, Harvey faces a mandatory minimum of ten years and up to 20 years in federal prison, at least five years and up to a lifetime of supervised release, and a $250,000 fine.
According To Acting U.S. Attorney Lisa G. Johnston
According to Acting U.S. Attorney Lisa G. Johnston and charging documents filed with the District Court, on June 29, 2022, Harvey was at Dismas Charities, Inc., a U.S. Bureau of Prisons residential reentry facility in St. Albans, West Virginia, facility staff found Harvey in possession of a cellular phone. Harvey was not allowed to possess a cellular phone without prior approval of his Probation Officer, and any cellular phone he possessed was subject to search and seizure at any time.
Law enforcement investigators conducted a forensic examination of Harvey’s confiscated cellular device and uncovered multiple digital images and video files depicting the sexual exploitation and abuse of children. As part of his guilty plea, Harvey admitted that the digital images and video files contained depictions of children engaged in sexually explicit conduct.
At the time of the instant offense in 2022, Harvey was on supervised release for his conviction of receiving child pornography in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia on March 12, 2007. Harvey was sentenced to 210 months in federal prison, followed by a lifetime of supervised release, for that crime. On August 17, 2022, Harvey was sentenced to 36 months in federal prison for committing while on supervised release in relation to unlawfully possessing the cellular phone that contained child pornography back in June 2022.
