SPOKANE, Wash. – A former editor of the Spokesman-Review pleaded guilty and received a sentence of 10 years in prison on Wednesday.
Steven Smith was involved in purchasing child sex abuse material via social media. Court docs said that Smith faced charges including one count of sexual exploitation of a minor and three counts of possession of minor engaged in sexually explicit content. Smith will serve 10 years in prison, followed by 18 months of community custody.
. Homeland Security Investigations looked into several minor victims in Kentucky who were using social media to send child pornography across the country in exchange for payments through ‘Cash App.’
Investigators connected Smith to some of these victims through an Instagram account. They found dozens of videos sent between April 2022 and January 2023, involving victims aged 10 to 14 years old.
At the time of his arrest, Smith had recently retired from teaching at the University of Idaho and resigned from the Spokesman-Review in 2008.
