Former Forsyth County Sheriff’s Sergeant Milton Scott Pruitt was convicted in July 2009 of receiving child pornography on his home and office computers and was sentenced to eight years in prison.
On Thursday, his attorney, Ann Fitz, told a panel of three judges at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta that Pruitt was convicted on insufficient evidence. Other evidence during his trial indicated the pornographic activity on his home computer was done not by Pruitt, but by either a computer virus or an unidentified hacker, she said.
Pruitt’s case became sensational in February 2008 when, eight months after his arrest by the GBI, he announced he was running for Forsyth County sheriff against incumbent Ted Paxton. He lost in the July primary. In August 2008 he was indicted on federal charges of receiving and possessing child pornography.
Pruitt was found guilty of two counts of receiving child pornography. The jury found him not guilty of possession of child pornography.
Since his sentencing in February 2010, Pruitt, who has long maintained his innocence, has been incarcerated in federal prison in Safford, Ariz. His wife, Kim Pruitt, and his mother and father were all in the courtroom Thursday. For three years they have sought to clear his name. Now they are fighting for his release from prison.
During Thursday's arguments, the judges asked attorneys to explain the distinctions between "viewing" and “receiving” and "knowingly receiving" and “possessing” files on a computer. Does accessing a file have to be intentional to be unlawful, they asked.
The judges -- J.L. Edmondson, Joel Dubina and Charles Wilson -- peppered Fitz and Assistant U.S. Attorney Elizabeth McBath with those questions as the lawyers sought to make their arguments within their fifteen minutes of allotted time.
“If you view it on the screen at all, I contend that you have received it for that crime,” Edmondson told Fitz, interrupting her within seconds of the start of her argument. Later, Edmondson reiterating: “It seems to me the only real issue is whether Pruitt intended to view it, which could be a big issue.”
Wilson said, “This is the first case where we’re going to have to decide what it means to knowingly receive pornography, even on the Internet.”
McBath told the judges the evidence was sufficient to show Pruitt “knowingly received child pornography” on his laptop work computer. “We would not have indicted him if we did not believe he did not seek those images out,” she said.
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