A 53-year-old Bellevue man found in possession of one of the largest caches of child pornography in the history of the Western District of Washington back in 2011 was sentenced to nine years in prison Tuesday.
William M. Orr was arrested in Iowa in June 2012, where he’d relocated after law enforcement seized more than seven terabytes of digital storage from the Bellevue home he shared with his parents the year before. He was charged with distribution of child pornography after more than 800,000 images and videos were found of children being raped and sexually assaulted. As part of his sentencing, U.S. District Court Judge John C. Coughenour ordered Orr pay restitution to the identifiable children from his cache of pornography, who will require life-long therapy, according to a release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
A Homeland Security investigation into Orr started when he used a peer-to-peer file sharing network to provide a number of these images to an undercover agent. The release states Orr continued to compile child pornography after the investigation began and he relocated to Iowa.
After serving his prison sentence, Orr will be placed on supervised release for 25 years.
“Every one of the more than 800,000 images and video files in Orr’s possession depicted a child being victimized,” said Brad Bench, special agent in charge of ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations in Seattle, in a statement. “We must not forget these are real children – real victims – who are subjected to sexual violence. Those who trade child pornography over the Internet are a part of a disturbing cycle of violence against children. HSI will continue to aggressively target those who prey on and sexually exploit children. We owe it to youngsters, who will carry the emotional and physical scars of these crimes with them for the rest of their lives.”