CLEARFIELD – A Philipsburg man waived his right to a preliminary hearing before his scheduled hearing date on Feb. 14.
Todd Alan Dixon, 41, is accused of one count of possession of child pornography.
The charge stems from an incident on Feb. 26, 2004. According to court documents, Dixon received through mail an express envelope containing three videotapes depicting minors engaged in sexually explicit activity.
Records indicate that an investigation was started in January of 2004 based on information from a prior investigation. In March 2004, Postal Inspectors in Newark, New Jersey began a joint investigation with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Customs into a global child pornography enterprise.
Through the investigation they identified a company that used another company to process customer credit card transactions for subscriptions to child pornography Web sites. Search warrants were executed at various sites. As a result of these searched a number of customer records and transactions within the United States were recovered.
One of the customers revealed in the seized customer list is alleged to be Dixon. As part of an undercover investigation, Dixon was sent an introductory letter from an undercover company that offered an opportunity to purchase taboo videos. The letter included a questionnaire so people could specify their interests and request a listing of videos that matched their interests.
Dixon is alleged to have replied by checking that he was interested in pre-teen girls and young teen girls. Dixon was sent a video list in response to his request and he is reported to have ordered three videotapes. It is mentioned in court documents that as part of an investigation in the Midwest, Dixon was tested with a similar undercover program. He did not order videos in that one.
On Feb. 26, 2004 an express mail package containing the three tapes with the child pornography was delivered to Dixon’s residence. It is reported that Dixon accepted the package and took it into his residence.
Before the search of his residence was executed, Dixon began to leave but was stopped by postal inspectors who advised him of the search warrant. Dixon is reported to have been cooperative and returned to his home. He agreed to speak with the investigator.
During the interview Dixon is alleged to have admitted knowing that he ordered the videos knowing that they contained child pornography but he could not give a reason as to why he ordered them. It is also reported that Dixon admitted to paying for access to sites on the Internet that were advertised as art sites.
Dixon continued that these sites contained girls posed nude and not engaged in any type of sexual activity.
The search warrant was executed on Dixon’s home. Investigators seized the controlled delivery tapes as well other tapes to be reviewed.