Dallas man sentenced to more than 14 years in federal prison for possessing child pornography

DALLAS - A local man who admitted he possessed child pornography was sentenced on Friday to 14 years and two months in prison and ordered to serve a lifetime of supervised release. The sentence was announced by U.S. Attorney James T. Jacks of the Northern District of Texas. The case was investigated by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Office of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), and by the Dallas Police Department's (DPD) Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Unit.

According to documents filed in the case, Dustin Mishler, 29, of Dallas, freely admitted that he possessed images and videos of actual prepubescent children engaged in sexually explicit acts and that some of the images and videos depicted sadistic and/or masochistic acts. At the Dec. 3 sentencing hearing, Chief U.S. District Judge Sidney A. Fitzwater noted Mishler's prior conviction in 2006 in Dallas County for possessing child pornography.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children advised DPD that they had received a cyber tip from the Internet browser AOL concerning a subscriber who had transmitted child pornography over the AOL Internet service network on May 10, 2009. The investigation revealed that the subscriber was Mishler. DPD executed a search warrant at Mishler's residence on June 23, 2009. Mishler was not present, but his girlfriend and roommate indicated that Mishler had a computer, but had sold it a few weeks earlier to a pawn shop. Law enforcement seized a USB drive, paperwork, seven CDs and one DVD from the residence.

Law enforcement located Mishler's pawned laptop computer at Cash America, just a few blocks from his residence, on June 3, 2009. A search warrant for the computer was obtained and a forensic examination, conducted by the North Texas Regional Computer Lab (NTRCFL), revealed that Mishler's computer and USB drive contained three videos and 64 images of child pornography. The forensic exam also determined that Mishler had used Yahoo! Messenger to send images of child pornography.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Camille Sparks, Northern District of Texas, prosecuted this case.

This investigation is part of Operation Predator, a nationwide ICE initiative to protect children from sexual predators, including those who travel overseas for sex with minors, Internet child pornographers, criminal alien sex offenders, and child sex traffickers.

ICE encourages the public to report suspected child predators and any suspicious activity through its toll-free hotline at 1-866-DHS-2ICE. This hotline is staffed around the clock by investigators.

Suspected child sexual exploitation or missing children may be reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, an Operation Predator partner, at 1-800-843-5678 or http://www.cybertipline.com.