Chico-Area Businessman Convicted of Distribution and Possession of Child Pornography

March 2, 2010 - SACRAMENTO, CA—United States Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner announced that last Friday, a federal jury returned guilty verdicts against JAMES THOMAS FLOCKER, 69, of Paradise, for distribution and possession of child pornography.

This case is the product of an extensive investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Chico Safe Streets Task Force; members of the Task Force who participated in this case included special agents from the FBI as well as members of the California State University, Chico (Chico State) Police Department.

According to Assistant United States Attorneys Camil A. Skipper and Kyle Reardon, who prosecuted the case, evidence presented at trial showed that on two separate occasions in 2003 and 2004, FLOCKER sent child pornography through the Internet, and in August 2003, he pretended to be a 19-year-old from Southern California and traded pictures with an 18-year-old man in South Carolina.

In July 2004, the defendant uploaded four pictures of nude teenage boys to a Yahoo group. By uploading these images to the group, the defendant made them available to all of the members of the group to add to their collections of child pornography or to distribute them to other collectors. One of the pictures was of a young man from Kentucky who was molested by a foster-care provider between the ages of 12 and 14. Images of this boy, along with nearly two-dozen additional images of child pornography, were found on the defendant’s computer following a search of his DVD production business on October 27, 2004.

FLOCKER is scheduled to be sentenced by United States District Judge John A. Mendez on May 18, 2010, at 9:30 a.m. He faces a maximum statutory penalty of up to 20 years, a fine of $250,000, and a life term of supervised release. The actual sentence, however, will be determined at the discretion of the court after consideration of any applicable statutory factors and the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which take into account a number of variables.