Ellis County

Waxahachie Man Sentenced to 20 Years For Promotion of Child Pornography

Promotion of child pornography is a second-degree felony punishable by two to twenty years in prison and possession of child pornography is punishable by two years to ten years in prison

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Ellis County officials announce that 39-year-old Jon Russell Whitson, of Waxahachie, has been sentenced to a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison for the promotion of child pornography.

Whitson was also convicted of ten counts of Possession of Child Pornography.

On Thursday, May 5, Instagram flagged Whitson's account and sent a cyber tip to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children regarding an image of child pornography, along with a video that Whitson shared. Instagram disabled the account but Whitson created a new one within a month.

The information regarding the tip was sent to the Waxahachie Police Department a few weeks later and they began an investigation.

The Waxahachie Police Department served a search warrant on August 18 to Whitson's resident, where investigators seized his phone for subsequent forensic testing and the Department of Homeland Security Investigations Division conducted the data extraction of Whitson's phone.

According to Ellis County officials, the phone contained several images and videos of the sexual abuse of children. Due to graphic nature, only a few of those videos and images were shown to the jury.

The judge determined that Whitson would serve the 20-year sentence, followed by an additional 2-year sentence assessed by the jury.

District Attorney Ann Montgomery says her office will prosecute anyone who would promote or profit from child pornography.

"Each image of child sexual abuse represents a real child who was victimized. This child continues to be victimized every time an offender downloads, possesses, and trades these horrendous and vile images."

After Whitson is released from prison, he will be placed on community supervision to serve out the rest of his sentence. He will be required to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.

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