Washington City man sentenced after police find images of child porn on cell phone

Utah State Prison west entrance, Draper, Utah, date not specified | Photo courtesy of DR04, Wikipedia Commons, St. George News

ST. GEORGE — A Washington City man was sentenced to prison after multiple images of child pornography were discovered on his phone during an unrelated missing persons case two years ago.

Anthony W. Tarchick, of Washington City, Utah, booking photo, Dec. 9, 2018 | File photo courtesy of the Washington County Sheriff’s Office, St. George News

Anthony W. Tarchick, 29, appeared in 5th District Court for sentencing where he pleaded guilty to three second-degree felony counts of sexual exploitation of a minor.

The defendant was sentenced to serve 1-15 years in the Utah State Prison on each of the three counts and the sentences were ordered to run concurrently with credit for time served. Additionally, more than $57,000 in fines were suspended in the case.

The images on his phone were discovered after the device was taken by the Washington City Police during a missing person investigation in December 2018 when Tarchick told police he had deleted messages from the missing man. The phone was later put through a digital forensics analysis, but instead of recovering deleted messages, the examination revealed multiple images of child pornography involving children believed to be under the age of 10, according to court documents.

Tarchick was arrested Dec. 19, 2018 and booked into Purgatory Correctional Facility and has remained in custody ever since. The missing persons case was later resolved and was not related to the sexual exploitation charges.

The case has been wrought with a number of motions and court filings related to the evidence against the defendant, including a motion filed by the defense to quash the testimony of the officer who testified at the preliminary hearing held at the end of September.

The defense filed the motion on the grounds that the officer, who was also the sole witness testifying for the state, had never seen a report from the Dixie State University Crime Lab that conducted the forensic examination of the phone, nor had he viewed the alleged images, which Tarchick’s defense attorney, Ed Flint, said disqualified the officer from testifying on the evidence in court.

Flint also alleged the report was never provided in the discovery materials sent to the defense and that it was not offered into evidence at the preliminary hearing, nor were any of the “images alleged to be child pornography,” or any of the metadata or search terms used to allegedly search for the images, Flint stated in the court record.

The state objected to the defense’s motion on the grounds that the officer was allowed to testify as to what he was told by a fellow detective pertaining to the results of the forensic examination of the phone during the preliminary hearing, according to documents filed by Washington County Prosecutor, Zachary Weiland, in October.

2019 file photo of attorneys, including prosecutor Zachary Weiland shown to the right, awaiting the verdict as the jury returns from deliberating during the murder trial of Kevin Ray Mcatlin, 29, St. George, Utah, April 19, 2019 | Photo by Cody Blowers, St. George News

Weiland alleged in the objection that the state had grounds put the officer on the stand during the preliminary hearing because he was only testifying to what he was told by the detective.

The officer had been told that 15 images of child pornography were discovered on the defendant’s phone which included images of children ages 5-8 performing sexual acts. He was also told that the images were searched for using a number of terms, including “very young underage porn,” court records indicate.

With no evidence to contradict that the defendant was the sole owner of the phone, “probable cause existed and the court was correct in binding the defendant over for trial,” Weiland stated in the record.

District Judge Eric A. Ludlow agreed with the state and denied the motion which also meant the case would be scheduled for trial.

That trial never took place after the defendant pleaded guilty to the charges during a resolution hearing held Nov. 14.

During Tuesday’s sentencing hearing, the defendant was ordered into the custody of the Washington County Sheriff’s Office to be transported to the Utah State Prison to begin serving his sentence.

Copyright St. George News, SaintGeorgeUtah.com LLC, 2020, all rights reserved.

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