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A Covington County jury has convicted Jonathan Lee Wallace, 49, of six counts of possession of obscene matter.

Circuit Judge Benjamin M. Bowden presided over the case. The State was represented at trial by Chief Assistant District Attorney Grace Jeter. 

The evidence at trial showed that Google reported to law enforcement, through a cyber tip, that the Google account registered to Jonathan Lee Wallace had downloaded and uploaded images of child pornography.  At the same time, Google disabled the account. The cyber tip was referred to Covington County Sheriff’s Office Investigator Joey Cato, who obtained search warrants for the Google account and for Wallace’s home. The data package Google sent in response to the search warrant revealed six images of obscene matter — all of which were explicit images of nude children under the age of 10 years. Four of the images also contained nude adult males. While law enforcement was executing the search warrant, Wallace told Investigator Cato that he had downloaded and stored child pornography on his cellular phone, claiming he had planned to email it to “some national center for child abuse” — but never did. He also said that after Google had disabled his account, he destroyed the phone and then threw it in the trash. Wallace later admitted to Capt. Mike Irwin of the Covington County Sheriff’s Office that he searched for child pornography at least once a month and said that the girls in the images he had stored on his phone were “pretty to look at,” according to the District Attorney’s office.

Court records indicate that Wallace has prior convictions for second degree attempted sexual abuse and two convictions for violation of Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA). He also has pending charges of first degree sexual abuse and a SORNA violation.     

“Cases that involve the exploitation of children are always extremely difficult,” Jeter said. “The jury had to view graphic, horrible evidence of young children, and once you’ve seen them, those images stay with you.  You don’t ever forget the children.  Every day, special victims task forces, like Internet Crimes Against Children (known as ICAC) and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children work to find every picture and every video and to identify and rescue every single child.  The reality, however, is that even after a child is rescued from that kind of abuse, the images are still out there.  Those images are still available for pedophiles to download and share, and they will remain available as long as there is a market for child pornography.”

Jeter expressed her appreciation to everyone involved in this investigation.  “The work of the Covington County Sheriff’s Office — especially Joey Cato — with the assistance of ICAC ensured we had solid evidence to present to the jury.”

Judge Bowden set Wallace sentencing hearing for Oct. 8. Possession of obscene matter is a Class C felony. Because of Wallace’s prior felony convictions, he faces a sentencing range of 10 years up to life imprisonment for each conviction.

“Because of the rules of evidence, we couldn’t make the jurors aware of Wallace’s prior conviction for a sex crime involving a minor, of his status as a registered sex offender, or his other pending charges, but they can be considered by the judge for sentencing purposes,” said District Attorney Walt Merrell. “Wallace is a predator. We plan to ask Judge Bowden to sentence him to life imprisonment for each of these six convictions.”

Wallace remains in the custody of the Covington County Jail pending his sentencing hearing.