Print Version

TALLAHASSEE, FL - Attorney General Bill McCollum and State Attorney for the 13^th Judicial District, Mark Ober today announced that a Hillsborough County jury has found a Thonotosassa man guilty on charges of 26 counts of possession of child pornography. Marcus James Morgan, 30, was prosecuted by the State Attorney’s Office after an investigation by the Attorney General’s CyberCrime Unit in 2009.

Morgan’s possession of child pornography was discovered in April 2009, when CyberCrime investigators located images of child pornography during a routine undercover investigation and traced the images back to Morgan’s computer. A search warrant was served at his Thonotosassa home and digital evidence was seized to undergo forensic analysis. Many of the images reviewed by investigators were of children appearing to be between the ages of 5-13 years old.

Morgan will be sentenced in February by the Honorable Judge Chet A. Tharpe in Florida’s 13^th Judicial District and could face a minimum of 24 years in prison according to the sentencing guidelines in Florida Statutes. The investigation was assisted by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office. The agencies involved in the case are all members of the Central Florida Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Force.