Bentonville man, 54, sentenced for child porn

BENTONVILLE — A Bentonville man was sentenced to 20 years in prison after admitting to possessing child pornography.

David Loran Thompson, 54, pleaded guilty Monday to 10 counts of distributing, possessing or viewing matter depicting sexually explicit conduct involving a child. The plea was under an agreement Herb Southern, Thompson’s attorney, reached with Tyler Dunn, deputy prosecutor.

Thompson was arrested in January 2021.

Bentonville police began investigating after receiving information about child pornography possibly being posted on Tumblr, an online social media outlet, according to the affidavit.

Tumblr confirmed three images were sent by the user, and the Center for Missing and Exploited Children identified the images as apparent child pornography, according to the affidavit.

Police were able to trace the postings to Thompson, the affidavit states.

Police questioned Thompson, who denied any involvement in viewing child pornography. He told police he’s a truck driver and part of a nonprofit organization Truckers Against Trafficking, which trains truck drivers to recognize and report instances of human traff icking, according to the affidavit.

He admitted to being involved in a group on Tumblr with thousands of people and pornographic material could be sent within the group. Thompson told police people would get kicked out of the group for sharing images of child pornography, according to the affidavit.

Police seized three cellphones from Thompson, and he gave police permission to search the devices. Police found a video of a 16-yearold girl in a bathroom, according to the affidavit.

Benton County Circuit Judge Robin Green accepted the plea agreement and Thompson’s guilty plea. He was sentenced to 20 years in the Arkansas Department of Corrections. He will be required to register as a sex offender and must complete a sex offender treatment program.

The judge ordered Thompson not to have any unsupervised contact with any minors.

Thompson