Former Child Abuser Sentenced in Child Pornography Case

LITTLE ROCK—Jane W. Duke, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas, and Thomas J. Browne, Special Agent in Charge of the Little Rock Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), announced Doyle D. Peal, age 58, of Benton, Arkansas, was sentenced by Chief United States District Judge J. Leon Holmes to 180 months' imprisonment for the receipt of child pornography. Peal’s sentence will be followed by supervised release for life. Peal faced a 180-month minimum mandatory sentencing range because he had two prior convictions related to offenses involving minors. Specifically, Peal was convicted in Saline County, Arkansas of carnal abuse of a minor in 1984, and on a federal charge for the receipt of child pornography in1992.

In June, 2006, FBI agents in Little Rock received information from FBI Headquarters that several child pornography websites were using the payment services of E-Gold to sell child pornography. The agents obtained and executed a search warrant on the E -Gold servers. Transaction records revealed Doyle D. Peal of Benton, Arkansas, was an account holder of E-Gold and had made numerous purchases of child pornography using that service.

On September 7, 2007, FBI agents contacted Peal and he consented to be interviewed. During that interview, Peal admitted he had been downloading child pornography via the Internet since 2004. Peal acknowledged that he had opened an E-Gold account for the purpose of purchasing child pornography from the Internet. Peal further consented to the search of his laptop computer. An on-site preview revealed numerous images of underage nude boys. The computer was seized and a forensic examination revealed over 5,000 images of child pornography, with many containing images of children under the age of twelve.

At the sentencing hearing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Marsha Clevenger requested Peal be under supervised release for life following incarceration, citing his two previous convictions. The Court agreed and ordered, in addition to lifetime supervision, that Peal undergo extreme sex offender therapy, that he register as a sex offender, and that he forfeit his computer.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS), Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.

The case is a result of an investigation by Federal Bureau of Investigation. Assistant United States Attorney Marsha W. Clevenger prosecuted the case for the United States.

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