Two charged in Sedalia child porn case

A Sedalia man was jailed Thursday on charges of possession of child pornography, and a Sedalia woman was jailed on a charge of child abuse after police found lewd digital photos on a cell phone.

Donald Eric Rhodes, 35, of the 600 block of Colorado Lane, was charged in Pettis County Circuit Court Wednesday with four counts of possession of child pornography, a class C felony. He was being held at the Pettis County Jail in lieu of $100,000 bond.

Amy Nicole Johnson, 21, also of the 600 block of Colorado Lane, was charged in Pettis County Circuit Court Wednesday with two counts of child abuse, a class C felony. She was being held at the Pettis County Jail in lieu of a $7,500 bond.

Their arrests followed an investigation by Pettis County Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Tolbert Rowe into allegations made Sunday by a roommate that she found four pornographic images of a girl. The roommate, Deana Taylor, told Rowe she “became suspicious of Rhoads because of a ‘strange text message’ she received from” Rhodes earlier that day. She searched his cell phone and forwarded the questionable images to her own cell phone, according to a probable cause statement filed by Rowe in court.

Two images depicted “what appears to be a minor child lying on her back, naked from the waist down with her vagina exposed,” the probable cause statement said. The other two images showed a child sitting on a shower floor holding a shower head. “In those two images, the breast and vagina are visible,” Rowe wrote.

Rhodes told Rowe he did have the images on the phone, and that Johnson had sent them.

Johnson told Rowe that she did forward the photos to Rhodes. She had received an e-mail with two of the images, and she took the other two, according to Rowe’s probable cause statement.

Johnson also told deputies that she and Rhodes have discussed “sexual fantasies” that involved female children. She said she took the photos of the child taking a shower at the little girl’s home, according to the statement. The girl, believed to be 7, is the daughter of a friend of Johnson’s.

Rhodes, who had dated the girl’s mother, had asked Johnson to take photos of that girl specifically, Johnson told the deputy.

A class C felony is punishable by a maximum term of seven years in prison.

Rhodes was convicted on child porn charges in 2001 in Pettis County and in 2000 in St. Francois County.