(Ken Silva, Headline USA) The Justice Department announced Wednesday that it has charged former ABC News journalist James Gordon Meek with transporting child pornography—putting an end to months of speculation that followed the April 2022 FBI raid of Meek’s home.
The DOJ said in a press release that its investigation began in March 2021, when Dropbox reported that it found an account associated with Meek with child pornography uploaded.
That led to a court-authorized search of Meek’s residence in April 2022. According to the DOJ, several of Meek’s devices contained images depicting children engaged in sexually explicit conduct, and multiple chat conversations with users expressing enthusiasm for the sexual abuse of children.
The affidavit of investigating FBI agent Tonya Griffith includes graphic details of what was allegedly found on Meek’s devices.
According to Griffith, the FBI found chats between an account associated with Meek and other unnamed user, where Meeks allegedly asks the user whether he has ever “raped a toddler.”
Griffith also said Meek pretended to be a teenage girl on Snapchat in an effort to get other teenager to send naked pictures of themselves to him.
“During the search of Meek’s residence, law enforcement also located an Apple laptop in the living room area on a trunk to the right of the couch. A review of the images and videos on the computer revealed that approximately 90 images and videos of child pornography were located on the device,” Griffith added.
“For example, one video compiles multiple clips, including a scene where an adult female places her tongue on a naked toddler’s vagina and a scene where an adult male inserts his penis into a toddler’s vagina.”
Meek faces a mandatory minimum of five years in prison and a maximum of 20.
Before the FBI raided his home, Meek was writing a book with Lt. Col. Scott Mann about President Joe Biden’s calamitous military retreat from Afghanistan. The book, Operation Pineapple Express: The Incredible Story of a Group of Americans Who Undertook One Last Mission and Honored a Promise in Afghanistan, was published last August with Mann listed as the sole author.
Observers speculated whether the FBI’s raid on Meek’s home was related to his journalistic endeavors. Rolling Stone cited anonymous sources who said that Meek may have possessed classified material on his computer.
Meek previously caused a stir with his Hulu-streamed documentary 3212 UN-Redacted: An Ambush in Africa. The Pentagon Betrayal. It examines the U.S. cover-up of four Army Special Forces troops who were killed during a mission in the African country of Niger.
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
