Missouri Man Sentenced for Child Pornography and Sexual Contact with Teen

ST. LOUIS - U.S. District Judge Matthew T. Schelp on Tuesday sentenced a man who possessed child sexual abuse material and engaged in sexual contact with a teen he'd met online to 168 months in prison followed by a lifetime of supervised release.

Judge Schelp also ordered James Donald Goings, 36, of Overland, to pay $12,000 to the victims who have been identified in the child sexual abuse material that he possessed.

Goings pleaded guilty in March to one felony count of receipt of child pornography. He admitted possessing 2,500 images containing child sexual abuse material on a computer and 190 images in his Google account. He also admitted travelling to Illinois to engage in sexual contact with a 15-year-old that he met via Grindr, his plea agreement says. Goings was also in contact with another teen that he'd also met on Grindr. The second victim told investigators that during multiple video calls, Goings directed him to perform specific sexual acts, the plea says.

The St. Louis County Police Department and the Edwardsville (Illinois) Police Department investigated the case. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Nathan Chapman and Erin Granger prosecuted the case.

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 U.S. Attorneys' Offices and the Department of Justice Criminal Division's 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 https://www.justice.gov/psc.