Man charged with producing, transporting child porn

Hiding behind the username “davidbanks1014,” a 39-year-old man from Aurora in Illinois  is accused of enticing at least four underage girls to send sexually explicit images of themselves through a popular video-sharing app, federal authorities have said.

Richard Barnett, 39, of Aurora, was arrested at his home  morning on federal charges of producing and transporting child pornography. When the FBI led a search on his home, law enforcement seized electronic devices and several firearms. His license to carry a concealed handgun in Texas expired Oct. 4.

The person using the davidbanks1014 identity reached the girls through the Musical.ly app. Described in court documents as a federal employee hired in February and working out of Des Plaines, Barnett allegedly created the davidbanks1014 account while living at a corporate housing facility in Oklahoma City during his new-employee training. When one girl wouldn’t give him what he wanted, the complaint alleges, he sent her a photo of a semi-automatic handgun, a concealed-carry holster and a magazine full of ammunition. He told her it was his and described other guns he supposedly owned. He could and would shoot her, he wrote, threatening “I will wait till school starts and see what house you come out of,” according to authorities.

Joel R. Levin, acting U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, and John P. Sellack, acting special agent in charge of the FBI in Chicago, announced the charges in a news release, crediting FBI offices in New Orleans and Buffalo and sheriff’s offices in Florida and Louisiana with their roles in the investigation.

Barnett would face a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years and up to 30 years in prison if convicted on the charge of producing child pornography. A conviction on the count of transporting child porn would mean a mandatory minimum of five years but as many as 20 years’ imprisonment, according to the news release.