Greene County man sentenced to 50 years on federal charges of sexual exploitation and child pornography

INDIANAPOLIS – A Greene County man was sentenced to 50 years in prison on federal charges for sexual exploitation of a minor and the distribution/receipt of child pornography. He will also serve a lifetime term of supervised release, must pay $10,000 in restitution to the minor victim, and was also ordered to have no contact with the minor victim or victim's family.

Brett Alan Walker, mug shot from his arrest in November 2019

According to court documents, Brett Alan Walker, 30, of Switz City, used a minor victim to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of creating visual depictions of the child. The Indiana State Police were alerted to Walker’s online crimes in November of 2019 when Google reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children that Walker had uploaded sexually explicit images of a child to its servers. The State Police and FBI investigated the Cyber Tipline Report and confirmed that the suspect was a convicted sex offender. Police arrested Walker and rescued the child victim on the night before Thanksgiving of 2019. A review of the evidence seized showed that Walker was not only sexually exploiting the child, but he was also distributing images of the child in the social media chat application, Kik Messenger.

To find previous stories posted on GreeneStreets involving Walker and his arrest, click on the Tag “Brett Allan Walker” below this story. Also see update on this case posted below this story.

Walker was previously convicted of child molestation in Marion County in 2010 and while on probation for that offense, he was convicted of criminal confinement in 2011, for an offense involving a 14-year-old girl. Walker was released from the Indiana Department of Corrections on December 31, 2016, less than 3 years before he committed the federal offenses.

“Walker’s fifty-year sentence pales in comparison to the sentence he imposed on the minor victim,” said Acting U.S. Attorney John E. Childress. “Walker’s actions have demonstrated that he should never have the ability to be in any type of contact with children. This sentence will help ensure that.”

“This lengthy sentence should send a loud and clear message that, while you may think you can hide behind the anonymity of the internet to commit these crimes, we will identify you and bring you to justice,” said FBI Indianapolis Special Agent in Charge Paul Keenan. “The FBI and our law enforcement partners will continue to work diligently to combat the sexual exploitation of our children.”

This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Indiana State Police-Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, the Martinsville Police Department, and the Greene County Prosecutors Office.

Assistant United States Attorney Kristina Korobov prosecuted the case.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, 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.justice.gov/psc

UPDATE on Walker’s case in Greene County: See previous stories for information on Walker’s arrest and the criminal case filed against him in Greene County. (Find those stories by clicking the Tag “Brett Allan Walker” below.) After he was charged in Greene County, Walker was indicted on federal charges in February of 2020 and a federal warrant was issued for his arrest out of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana. On February 6, 2020, Greene County Prosecutor Jarrod Holtsclaw filed a motion to dismiss the case in Greene County for the reason that Walker was indicted on federal charges.