Vancouver man accused of having, dealing child pornography

A 47-year-old Vancouver man appeared today in Clark County Superior Court on suspicion of dealing or possessing several thousand images and videos of child pornography.

Richard L. Walsh is set to be arraigned March 29 on charges of first-degree dealing in child pornography, first-degree possession of child pornography and first-degree Internet viewing of child pornography.

An undercover FBI database revealed that Walsh was sharing multiple child pornography digital files between December 2011 and Feb. 13 of this year in a peer network on the Internet, according to a probable cause affidavit.

Peer-to-peer networks allow users connected to the Internet to link their computers and are commonly used for illegal activity, according to the FBI’s website.

The affidavit said:

The FBI informed Vancouver police on Feb. 4 that Walsh was suspected of having and dealing child pornography and provided the police department with 100 digital image files downloaded from Walsh’s computer.

Vancouver police served a search warrant Feb. 13 at Walsh’s home and seized 7,650 image files and 59 video files of child porn from his digital devices, according to the affidavit. Young boys were largely featured in the content, but there also were pornographic images of young girls, and also of a dog. Some of the children were infants and toddlers.

Walsh admitted that he had been looking at child pornography for about two years, according to the affidavit.