Texas, Sept. 0 9, 2016 – A former employee of Texas A&M University, Mathew Irwin (47) from Galveston, Texas has been committed to prison for possession of child pornography, U.S. Attorney Kenneth Magidson has announced.
Irwin pleaded guilty to the two count charges brought against him on March 22, 2016.
But U.S. District Judge George C. Hanks Jr handed him 97 months sentence taking into consideration all materials presented including victim impact statements.
Irwin will serve 10 years of supervised release following completion of his prison term, during which time he will have to comply with numerous requirements designed to restrict his access to children and the Internet. Irwin will also be ordered to register as a sex offender.
Irwin was employed as an associate professor for Texas A&M Galveston at the time of his arrest. He had come to the attention of law enforcement after investigators found evidence he was accessing files from a website known to contain child pornography.
Law enforcement executed a search warrant at his residence on Aug. 6, 2015, at which time they seized a laptop and various external storage media devices.
The forensic examination revealed more than 4,000 images and two videos of clearly young children engaged in sexually explicit conduct. These movies and images included children under the age of 12 engaged in acts of violence. Some of the images are of known victims as identified through the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Irwin admitted he downloaded child pornography from the Internet, thereby receiving and possessing the child pornography found on his computer and external storage media.
Previously released on bond, Irwin was permitted to remain on bond and voluntarily surrender to a U.S. Bureau of Prisons facility to be determined in the near future.
