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00:00The following program documents real law enforcement investigations of child sexual predators.
00:05This deeply disturbing content may be triggering for some viewers. Please watch with care.
00:13Next, Detective Tony Godwin faces an all-or-nothing choice as he races to take down a child predator.
00:21We have yet to get 100% visual on his face. I have a decision to make. Do we stay
00:27or do we go?
00:30After Tony's team arrests him, he reveals his devious intentions.
00:35I wasn't interested in your course, but I'm not saying that nothing else could happen.
00:40FBI! Open the door!
00:43Then, someone at this house downloaded child sexual abuse material.
00:48Was it the father or the son?
00:52There are things on the internet that are expensive.
00:55The truth is more disturbing than Tony could ever imagine.
01:00And the team scrambles to identify the owner of child sexual abuse material dumped outside a church.
01:06Very disturbing images of very young girls. The guy's a monster.
01:10When Tony finally catches up with him, he presents an unusual defense.
01:14We're all human beings and we're going to see him.
01:18Unbelievable! This guy has got a serious problem.
01:24A team of police professionals in North Dallas has one goal.
01:28Get out of the door!
01:29Take down online predators before they harm a real child.
01:34Child predators are everywhere.
01:37Online predators pose the biggest danger to America's children today.
01:42Kids are being targeted at an alarming rate.
01:45This team is opening its case files for the first time to show you how it tracks them down.
01:52All right, it's coming this way.
01:54And brings them to justice by any means necessary.
02:01This is Detective Tony Godwin and his team is the Predator Hunters.
02:08December 13th, 2012, Tony's team pursues a suspect along a highway in North Dallas.
02:16Tony believes the driver of this pickup is a determined Predator that he first encountered just hours earlier.
02:26But he's been unable to make a positive ID. Is this Tony's suspect or is the real Predator still on
02:34the loose?
02:40Rodney Thompson. This is the fastest takedown I've ever conducted.
02:46From first contact to his arrest was under four hours.
02:50We didn't know we had the right guy until we actually arrested him.
02:54We had to act rapidly and really think creatively to catch this Predator.
03:09It's Christmas time of 2012 and I'm on the internet trolling around looking for someone to hit on me.
03:15In 2012 all the kids were in these Yahoo chat rooms just to talk to people
03:19and do so with a bit of anonymity.
03:22Problem was these rooms were littered with predatory types.
03:26I set up a profile under the name Brittany, a 14 year old girl from Texas.
03:31I use images of a colleague of mine who has provided me consent to use her photographs in these undercover
03:36cases.
03:38Once I get the profile established, I go into a room called Texas 2 and I just sit and wait.
03:47Within a couple of minutes I get a direct message.
03:51The user's name is R-Y-C-H-E-0426. Imagine my surprise. What does he want to know from
03:58me? How old I am.
04:02I let him know right away I'm 14, but I'll be 15 soon.
04:08This is where he should say, hey, I'm really sorry you're too young. Thanks for your time. Be careful. There's
04:13a lot of weirdos here.
04:14But that's not what happens. He replies back that he's 38.
04:19He doesn't seem to have a care in the world that he's talking to a child.
04:27I don't think his name is Mike. It's a big difference from the username, so I'm guessing that's probably not
04:32true.
04:33He sends a request for me to accept his webcam. I accept. I might get a good visual of what
04:39he looks like.
04:43He's a white male, late 30s, early 40s, kind of going bald. He's got wire-rimmed glasses on.
04:49But the weird thing is, this guy has no shirt on, right off the bat.
04:54I'm not going to turn my webcam on, but I said I would give him a photo, so I send
04:58pictures of Britney as I promised.
05:04He then escalates saying, send me a sexy picture.
05:08I'm not doing that.
05:11Nice try.
05:14I need him to be very clear what his true intentions really are.
05:18So I send him a message, and he replies right back.
05:24Typically, an investigation like this can go on for several weeks.
05:27But we're 40 minutes into this conversation. This guy's asking if we can meet up and go shopping together.
05:35This guy's on fire. I've never had one move this fast.
05:41Over the next hour, things escalate pretty quickly.
05:45He asks if I have any interest in penises.
05:52I'm a grown man, a big dude, married with kids.
05:56No, I don't want to see your penis, but I'm going to go ahead and play along with you, sir.
06:04Thank you very much, sir. You've just committed a crime. Transfer obscene material to a minor.
06:09I feel almost obligated to reply back, and so I make some sort of compliment about the size.
06:17The next thing I know, he starts masturbating.
06:20All unbelievable evidence, because I'm screen recording everything that he's doing.
06:30Then he tells me something that really changes everything.
06:35He's got access to kids. The urgency of this thing just went up big time.
06:41I want to know more, so I asked him about this family.
06:46He has a son and a daughter. His daughter is 14.
06:50This guy's talking sexually to this 14-year-old profile of mine.
06:54When he has a daughter the same age, that's a big problem.
06:58I need to act fast to make something happen and get this guy in custody.
07:02I know that if we're friends on Yahoo chat rooms,
07:05there's a chance I could see more biographical information, so I suggest we add each other.
07:09Boom. He accepts it, and I was right.
07:12I get to see now a full name, Mike Johnson.
07:15I need to try to find out some information, so I ask him, what's your favorite car?
07:24Very nice information. Thank you for that.
07:28Tony enlists Detective Clint McNeer to unmask Mike Johnson.
07:35We have some very important pieces of information.
07:38We have an age. He's 38 years old.
07:43We know that he has two children. Their ages are 12 and 14.
07:48We know we have a possible name, Mike Johnson.
07:54And lastly, he drives a Chevy.
07:59I take all the information that we have, I put it in the police database,
08:03and I end up with a big fat zero, which tells me Mike Johnson is probably a fake name.
08:09Our predators lied to us.
08:13I'm kind of hunting blind.
08:15In my mind, this guy is an immediate danger to children.
08:19I have no idea who this guy is, where this guy is.
08:23But his enthusiasm is something I think I can really exploit.
08:38I suggest the movie theater.
08:40It's a really good location because it's got a lot of visibility, and it's easy for him to find.
08:471230 only gives me like 90 minutes to put together an operation.
08:51That's probably the fastest this has ever happened in my entire career.
08:59Clint races to devise the takedown plan.
09:03This is a satellite view of the theater. There's a sporting goods store next door.
09:08Tony is parked in an unmarked vehicle here, where he can get to the theater quickly,
09:14as well as see the entire front view.
09:17I only have a picture of this guy, and I have what I believe is a vehicle he uses,
09:22but not much else to go on.
09:23There are so many things that can go wrong with this takedown.
09:27He could spot one of our covert cars. He could see some of our surveillance.
09:31He could just get spooked and chicken out.
09:35We have this entire theater surrounded to manage the situation and to get him into custody.
09:41We're in place. We're waiting. We're taking him down.
09:49Tony's team prepares a high-risk takedown at a North Texas movie theater.
09:54All Tony has to go on is a grainy image of the predator
09:59and a description of his vehicle.
10:02Everybody hold tight.
10:04I don't see this guy out in front of the theater.
10:07Then I get a report from my surveillance team.
10:10A person matching the suspect's description has gone inside a sporting goods store.
10:15My first thought is, is he trying to lure us out from where we're sitting?
10:19We've got to process this quickly, still while being concealed and not getting burned.
10:23You're trying to make split-second decisions.
10:26I could order a team to move in, but we have yet to get 100% visual on his face
10:32to confirm he's the guy in our photo. It could be anybody. And so we just sit and wait.
10:40The man makes a purchase and heads for the exit.
10:43The surveillance team see him leaving the store and walking back towards the truck.
10:48I don't know what is going on at this point.
10:50And then the worst-case scenario happens. His truck drives off and he leaves.
10:55I have a decision to make. Do we stay or do we go?
11:00Tony tells us, go get him.
11:05Tony and Clint follow the suspect's vehicle onto the highway.
11:09We still don't know at this point if it's an innocent civilian or a dangerous predator.
11:14We can't just simply pull this guy over. We have to have a reason.
11:17And then we get a stroke of luck. He's got a brake light that's out.
11:22Bam. We've got a lawful reason to get this guy pulled over.
11:31We get him pulled over on this traffic violation. But is this the guy that we've been looking for?
11:38They ask him to step out.
11:42It's a guy in the photo that Tony sent.
11:47He's not asking, you know, what the hell's going on? Why are you stopping me?
11:51I get his driver's license.
11:54Do you have anything in your pocket that you need to know about?
11:56No, sir, I don't.
11:57We finally have a real name. Rodney Thompson.
12:06This is the fastest meet and takedown I've ever had my entire career.
12:10It's only been a total of four hours since I initially communicated with this guy.
12:14And here he is in handcuffs. It's a really good feeling.
12:29Going into this interview, I have no idea if this guy's going to lie to me or tell me the
12:34truth.
12:34Why do you think you're here?
12:36I'm on my association with a minor.
12:38And what do you think that means?
12:39It means that I was in communication with what I thought was someone of your age.
12:46And it comes to an understanding with that person that there's going to be a meeting.
12:51Man, you don't get that very often. A guy who tells you the law almost verbatim for what it is.
12:58Had she been agreeing to do something sexually, do you believe it would have happened?
13:03Probably. I wasn't interested in intercourse. I'm not saying that nothing else could have happened.
13:09It probably would have happened. I'm going to be very honest with you.
13:12Wow. It's like it's not a big deal. It's just like, yeah, I did this.
13:17And he's very open about it, which is really kind of throwing me.
13:21The next thing he says really alarms me.
13:23There was an incident in Arizona in 2003 where I've been talking with a person online.
13:31Today we were 13 or 14. A similar situation happened where law enforcement were involved.
13:37There were never any charges followed.
13:39So whatever examination or forensic examination they did at that time prevailed, not enough for them to arrest you.
13:45Correct. How was they arrested?
13:46This probably explains why he's so calm and so cooperative.
13:50And I guess it sort of explains how he knew what the law was and quoted it back to me
13:54when I asked him initially.
13:55He's been here before. He just can't stop.
14:08May 2022. Tony joins the FBI on a dawn raid.
14:13FBI! Sam Bailey! Open the door!
14:16The feds have intel that someone living at this property downloaded hundreds of images of child sexual abuse material.
14:25They must find out, was it the father or the son?
14:30I'm with the task force. Can you come with me?
14:33The reality turns out to be more twisted than Tony could ever imagine.
14:43Usually we focus in on one suspect, but this case, unbelievably, this was a father and son duo.
14:50Samuel Allen and his son, Christopher Allen.
14:54We had solid evidence that one of these guys was responsible for downloading child sex abuse material,
15:00but figuring out which one was a real challenge.
15:08I get cases a number of ways. Sometimes I'm out there seeking a predator to hit on me in an
15:14undercover capacity.
15:15Sometimes I get a tip from the public.
15:17In this case, it came to me through Jen Mulliken, my contact at the FBI.
15:22Jen works on the child exploitation unit.
15:24It's a real pleasure to work with her because she is in it to win it, and it doesn't matter
15:29what the sacrifice is.
15:32In May 2022, I get a notification that somebody in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex is downloading child
15:39sexual abuse material via a peer-to-peer platform. Peer-to-peer file sharing is where two particular
15:45users share direct computer to computer without having to go through another platform. Some of the
15:51images are of children under 10 years old. It's horrendous to look at. It's horrendous to know that it's
15:57being produced. I subpoenaed the service provider for the IP address. I get an address, and I get a name.
16:04Samuel Allen.
16:08He's 58 years old. I run the name through the DMV database, and I get an address, and that address
16:15is
16:15the same on the IP address information. That tells me that I definitely have the right place. I also get
16:20his vehicle information, a black 2014 Mazda, and I find out that Samuel Allen lives at that residence
16:27with a wife, a daughter, and a son. The son's name is Christopher Allen.
16:36Predominantly, this kind of activity is conducted by males, so I'm going to focus my investigation
16:41on Samuel and Christopher Allen. A check of further database records shows that Samuel Allen is an
16:48engineer. Christopher is a teacher. He could be producing images and videos depicting any of the
16:56students in his classes. This becomes a top priority case. I have got to find out what's going on at
17:02this
17:02house. I get a search warrant, and we pick a date to approach the house and knock on the door
17:08and see
17:08what's going on in there.
17:22FBI! Sam Allen! Open the door! Ben Flores!
17:27I've done hundreds and hundreds of these raids. You never lose that kind of excitement.
17:34FBI! That is the loudest knock and announce I've ever heard in my life.
17:39FBI! Open the door! Open the door! Open it!
17:45I bet Sam Allen is dropping a deuce.
17:50It's the police! Open the door! Open the door!
17:55Watch it! Suddenly, somebody comes to the door.
17:57One at the door. I'm down here.
18:00Samuel Allen. He has no idea what's going on.
18:07Mr. Allen? Yes, ma'am. I mean, yes, sir.
18:12All right, listen. We're going to take these handcuffs off you. I just need you to cooperate.
18:15Yes, sir.
18:16Okay?
18:16Yes.
18:17All right.
18:17Yeah, I know we got you out of bed, and you're all a little...
18:19Yes, I don't know what the heck.
18:21All right, we're going to walk over to this truck.
18:22I want to have a conversation with you, okay?
18:23Yes, sir.
18:24Okay, come with me.
18:25Yes.
18:26Let's get in the front seat, Sam.
18:28As it turns out, this is going to be an interview unlike anything I've ever done before.
18:39Detective Tony Godwin interviews Samuel Allen to unlock the mystery of who at his home
18:44downloaded child sexual abuse material via a peer-to-peer network.
18:49I am on what's called the Northern Texas Internet Crimes Against Children test.
18:54Okay.
18:54Okay.
18:55Okay.
18:55What I'm here today about specifically is child pornography.
19:01Illicit material is being shared back and forth from here at this house.
19:05Uploaded, downloaded.
19:06Is that something you've ever done or participated in?
19:09Just downloading regular porn.
19:12Regular porn.
19:13Yeah.
19:14Okay.
19:14Okay.
19:15Do you do anything related to file sharing?
19:19I've done things related to downloading, but not sharing.
19:25Like what?
19:25Music, movies, that kind of stuff?
19:27Downloading movies.
19:28Okay.
19:29From the internet.
19:30This is an image of a young girl performing an oral sex act on a male.
19:36Does that look familiar to you at all?
19:39No.
19:39All I'm doing is watching him and his expressions.
19:43He did his like a ooh face.
19:46Yeah.
19:47Like he was in disagreement.
19:49And that was a very immediate response, so it seemed genuine.
19:53He's clearly denying that it's him.
19:54I do think I need to have a chat with the son as well.
20:02FBI agents are detaining Christopher Allen in another vehicle.
20:06As Tony approaches, one of the agents hands him Christopher's phone.
20:11Now I want to know what's on this device.
20:15Hey, Christopher.
20:16Hey, I'm Tony Godwin.
20:17I'm with the task force.
20:19Can you come with me?
20:20We're going to switch trucks over here.
20:21I want to have a conversation with you about some stuff.
20:24This is my body cam.
20:27We got to have that going.
20:28That's part of our process.
20:31Look at the guy's face.
20:32He literally looks sick.
20:34Maybe you were right when you were thinking that maybe it wasn't the dad that was doing it.
20:38When I tell you that everybody here on this task force is here related to child exploitation,
20:44does it give you any indication why we would be having a conversation with you?
20:51Do you think it's coming to mind?
20:53Tell me about it.
20:55Well, I'm thinking there are things that I might have come in contact with on the internet that are
21:02realistic and savory.
21:03Okay.
21:04And related to kids?
21:06As we talk about child pornography,
21:09have you seen those types of images and videos?
21:15Not involving real life people.
21:18No.
21:19Are you talking about anime?
21:20Or are you talking about something else?
21:23Drawings, yes.
21:26There is some very, very sexually graphic deviant material that's anime related.
21:32It's cartoon related or AI generated.
21:35There is a charge that can be levied against somebody that looks at that.
21:40But that's not what I'm there to investigate.
21:41I'm there to investigate specific child sex abuse material I know was downloaded from that home.
21:48He just looks like a balloon ready to pop.
21:51We just need to stick with it and see what else he's going to come up with.
22:05Do you look at child pornography on this specific device?
22:13There's like, I think, over 13,000 items in here.
22:20Do you utilize file sharing programs?
22:23No, not at all.
22:25Have you ever?
22:27No.
22:28When you're on these darker parts of the internet, there are things you click on that you shouldn't.
22:39And then there's a bunch of different pop-ups and sometimes things download.
22:46But I don't remember anything of that sort.
22:52Christopher does not know what file sharing is about.
22:55Even though what he's got is a problem, he's not our guy.
22:58All right, sir. Come on out.
23:02I need to go back and talk to his dad.
23:05What I'm thinking at this moment is the apple hasn't fallen far from the tree.
23:09If I was going to go out on a limb and say, who's our guy?
23:12I'm pointing to Samuel.
23:13He's the only one that's even made any admission to file sharing.
23:17And that is why we're here.
23:22Detective Tony Godwin questions Samuel Allen for a second time.
23:27Here's the thing.
23:28Your son doesn't know anything about file sharing.
23:32I know you said you look at adult pornography.
23:35Is it possible that you downloaded child pornography in that process?
23:42If I did, it wasn't knowingly. I don't think so.
23:47What a weak ass denial. If I did, it was an accident. Okay.
23:53You've been investigating child sexual abuse material for years.
23:56Have you ever accidentally downloaded child porn?
24:01Never. Not one time. It just doesn't happen.
24:04Exactly.
24:04It's an excuse that gets brought up in court by so many defendants. It doesn't happen.
24:10If he's being accused of child pornography, he should be angry with you. But he's not.
24:15This is definitely going to be the guy who did the file sharing. No question in my mind.
24:21He's just struggling with admitting it.
24:23Since Sam Allen refuses to confess, Tony calls in a canine assistant.
24:28We're bringing what's called an electronic service dog to your house.
24:32He's on his way. It'll be about 15 minutes and he'll be here.
24:34That dog is very, very specifically trained to sniff out SD cards, SIM cards, memory cards,
24:42thumb drives, that kind of stuff.
24:44The ESD dogs help us locate devices that could have been missed during a physical search.
24:51The dog locates Samuel Allen's laptop. Digital forensic specialists scan it for illegal material.
24:58On that laptop, they found multiple images and videos of child sex abuse material.
25:03The material found was what initially triggered the FBI investigation into the Allen family.
25:09So all along, it was the father.
25:12When Jen takes him down to the federal jail, Samuel changes his position.
25:17He confesses that he was involved with child sexual abuse material and obtained these files from the internet.
25:24A forensic analysis of Christopher Allen's phone finds child sexual abuse material,
25:30as well as the illegal anime that he described to Tony.
25:34With one search warrant, we got two offenders. So a two for one, per se.
25:53This is really pretty extraordinary case. You have a father and a son, both looking at deviant material
26:00involving kids, both of them possessing material that's terrible, and neither one of them knows
26:06about each other. Like that is like mind-blowing to think about.
26:13December 2009, Tony interrogates the owner of one of the largest collections of child sexual abuse
26:19abuse material. Tony is used to predators twisting logic to justify their depraved fantasies,
26:34but this offender takes it to a whole new level.
26:39God does everything in your life for a purpose. He said, Bill, your sins are forgiven.
26:48This guy, William McBurney, his addiction to child sexual abuse material is so prolific,
26:53he must have spent every waking moment looking at it, storing it. When we did find this guy,
26:59the size of the collection shocked me and my entire team.
27:06In 2009, I was contacted by a Dallas detective. A church janitor handed him a bag with a laptop and
27:13two hard drives that were found inside of a dumpster. Thinking these might have been taken in a burglary,
27:19he searched one of the devices to figure out who they belong to. What he actually found was a huge
27:24amount of child sex abuse material, and I mean a huge amount.
27:33That detective handed off everything to me because this is the crime type that I work every day.
27:37The three devices were a laptop that had an 80 gigabyte hard drive, an external hard drive that was 250
27:44gigs,
27:45and then a third hard drive that was 16 gigabytes. In 2009, that was a big amount of data. We
27:53were used
27:53to much smaller devices. So what I do is submit these to a lab for analysis, and what I get
27:58back
27:59is absolutely staggering. 24 gigabytes, 16,922 images, 1,442 videos containing child sex abuse material from
28:12the ages of two months old. Things that I'm never going to be able to unsee. Babies.
28:20I am absolutely determined to figure out who this is and put him in jail.
28:30Detective Tony Godwin analyzes hard drives containing child sexual abuse material for clues that will
28:36reveal who dumped them. There's an ocean of material on these drives. There's just image after image
28:41after image. I don't want to have to see it, but I have to do it. It pays off. I'm
28:47able to find some
28:48photos that are not pornographic, and they're dated back to 2004. This middle-aged white male with a
28:55mustache. Maybe this is our guy. The photos are in a folder with the name of William.
29:02One of the photos shows a woman and a young child that looks to be about five years of age.
29:07This could be a family photo, or this could be, you know, a guy with his daughter and his grandkid.
29:12It's really kind of hard to determine. Now there's a child involved. It just ups the ante. It just raises
29:19the priority level and the importance of figuring out who he is and where he is. I find some other
29:23pictures of motorcycles, a car, and a van. In one of the photos, I can see a license plate.
29:30This I can use. I take the information I found. I pass it on to my colleague, Clint McNeer,
29:35see what he can find. I run the license plate through the DMV here in Texas, and I get a
29:41name. William
29:42Turner McBurney in the date of birth, September 14, 1952. The photo in the driver's license matches the photo
29:53that Tony had found during the evidence search. The address on his driver's license is one mile
29:59from the church where the evidence had been dumped.
30:05On December 8th of 2009, I'm watching the house like a hawk. I sit there for basically a whole day,
30:11and I don't see any signs of life. I try again. I go back for a second day. I sit
30:17there the whole day.
30:18I see nothing. On day three, I get a little luck. I see a woman and child leave the front
30:25of the residence,
30:25and they turn around to say goodbye, and I see her kiss and embrace a white male that's in the
30:30doorway.
30:31It's William McBurney. It's confirmation that he's got a child. What that does is make this the biggest
30:39priority I have. We have to act fast. We put together a search warrant and an arrest warrant,
30:45and within two hours, we're back at this residence, knocking on the door of this predator.
30:53Body-worn cameras are yet to become standard issue for Texas police officers.
30:57Tony and his team do wear audio recording devices.
31:10Hello. What we found behind this door is something I'm never going to forget.
31:17I'm Detective Godwin. I'd like to have a conversation with you.
31:20It's fine. I'm Bill.
31:22He really does sound pretty harmless and pretty friendly, but it's going to go one of two ways.
31:27Either he's going to climb up, or he's going to open up like a book, and he's just going to
31:31tell me everything.
31:32Bill, have you ever possessed copyright?
31:35Yes, sir, I have. I had a laptop. I threw that into the church dumpster up the street.
31:42What led you to throw that away?
31:44You might say it's an addiction. I want to leave that behind.
31:48Wouldn't it be nice if all predators, when they throw their computer away,
31:52they just stop praying on children?
31:54That would be kind of a rare thing. That doesn't happen very often.
31:57You had more than 680 images of infants being raped.
32:02I haven't been fooling with it. I haven't fooled with child pornography since I threw those away.
32:08Those computers were under your name. Those are your files.
32:11Just because you throw it away didn't mean the crime didn't happen. And clearly he can't grasp that.
32:16William McBurney is arrested for possession of child pornography for the material found in the dumpster.
32:22I have a warrant for your arrest right now to take you to jail.
32:25You do?
32:26Yes, sir, I do. Can you read it out loud for me, sir?
32:28I have the right to remain silent and not make any statement at all.
32:32Any statement I make may be used in evidence against me at my trial.
32:37Do you understand that?
32:38I understand that.
32:39He's really chill, pretty laid back. Like his only real concern is like wanting to change clothes.
32:44Can I put some long pants on?
32:46We'll get you some pants and get you a jacket and some shoes.
32:49And you will go down to the jail and get booked in.
32:52All right, sir.
32:53Tony's team searches McBurney's residence.
32:57A number of devices were found at McBurney's residence which were all seized to be examined at the forensic lab.
33:02One device is a thumb drive found inside the pocket of the shorts that McBurney removed when he was arrested.
33:12Tony interrogates McBurney at the police department.
33:15In nearly 20 years in this line of work, I've listened to predators use all manner of excuses to justify
33:21their behavior,
33:22but nothing as weird as what McBurney's about to tell me.
33:27We got your computer and those hard drives that were found, and it was turned over to the police like
33:34right away, and we fired.
33:37I should have taken a hammer.
33:40Our neighbors, they kept trying to get me to go to church, and one day I went to a family
33:47life group, and I got saved.
34:06The material involves the sexual abuse and rape of young children some infant age.
34:13I don't really think Jesus would be too condoning of that kind of behavior.
34:19The fact that he threw it away means nothing. He's going to have to suffer the consequences for his actions.
34:25This one charge that you have tonight is very likely going to extend into additional charges.
34:31Could you go to the prison?
34:32Yeah.
34:33You could go for a long time.
34:36McBurney is charged with five counts of possession of child pornography.
34:41The next day, on December 11, 2009, much to my surprise, there's bad news.
34:47William McBurney is able to make a $25,000 bond, and he's released until we go to trial.
34:54It's not something I was expecting. I didn't necessarily agree with it, but the law is the law.
35:01Usually, I don't hear from a suspect once they make bond, but with McBurney, it's different.
35:11It's embarrassing. It's humiliating.
35:13This dude's all over the TV. I think it's something that he's hopeful that'll be
35:30used in court to kind of help his plight. That dog's just not going to hunt with me.
35:39Detective Tony Godwin digs into the background of William McBurney,
35:43the self-confessed hoarder of child sexual abuse material.
35:47We put out a press release and let the public know,
35:49if you have any information about William McBurney or his activities,
35:54please reach out to us so we can investigate it.
35:56Several members of the public did provide information,
35:59and there were allegations of sexual abuse with kids in the past,
36:02as well as allegations about sexual tourism, but none of those allegations were ever proven to be true.
36:07One person tells Tony's team that it should search McBurney's former residence.
36:13There was an allegation that William McBurney drilled a hole from an attic space,
36:18threw the wall into a bathroom that was used by a child in the home,
36:22that he was possibly recording while she was in the shower.
36:26We searched McBurney's former residence.
36:29Behind the wall, above the bath, we find evidence that a peephole has been drilled and then filled in.
36:35It should be noted that the allegations did not involve any of the current family members
36:40that were in the home when he was arrested.
36:43We also learned of a storage facility kind of off-site from his property,
36:47and in that location was a van. And in that van were a laptop computer, 13 CDs,
36:54and books, all of which were also seized. The lab can follow up and figure out what exactly we have.
37:01The team also sends to the lab the thumb drive from the shorts that McBurney removed when he was arrested.
37:07We discovered 34,764 more images of child pornography.
37:17This larger quantity, I've never seen this before.
37:20The extreme young age of them, the guy's a monster. Then on the USB device found, in his shorts,
37:28there's 11 images and 55 videos of children engaging in horrible, horrible sex acts.
37:35This discovery suggests that McBurney was in the process of downloading child sexual abuse material
37:41when Tony and Clint knocked on his door six days earlier.
37:45When Clint comes and tells me the enormity of child sex abuse material found on the seized devices,
37:50I'm telling you, I'm speechless. But the most important factor is the thumb drive that was in his pocket
37:56tells me that all of that rhetoric that William McBurney spouted on the TV is a complete lie.
38:05Investigators find no evidence that William McBurney's wife and child feature in any of the
38:10child's sexual abuse material recovered from the electronic devices.
38:16On December 17th of 2009, we rearrested William McBurney on five additional counts of possession
38:23or promotion of child pornography. I get to interview McBurney a second time.
38:27Tony asked McBurney about the spy hole discovered in one of his former residences.
38:58Tony, let me tell you one thing. I have never
39:02touched any child, and I've never abused any child, and I've never done any hurting anybody or
39:12anything like that. I don't know if you believe it or not, but I'm telling you the truth.
39:16I'll tell you the truth about everything else.
39:20Next, Tony grills McBurney about the huge haul of child sexual abuse material found at the storage
39:27unit and the files on his thumb drive.
39:30There is more than 37,000 images of children being sexually exploited.
39:37You have a thumb drive in your pocket. Yes, you possessing that jump drive with those items,
39:4411 images, 55 videos, those indicate to me that you are still actively downloading things.
39:54I was upstairs when y'all knocked on the door. I was, I had that been downloading right then.
39:59Right then and there? Yeah.
40:00When you came and knocked on the door? Yeah, knocked on the door, yeah.
40:03Your wife and son were in the room.
40:05Turned into the house. They didn't. They didn't know.
40:09Unbelievable. It really makes sense to me now why he was so adamant about wanting to change his pants
40:14before we left his house. He's trying to put on an act to show that he has turned his life
40:20around,
40:20but his actions speak much louder than his words. He can't get away from this stuff. He's got a problem.
40:34You know McBurney's addiction to child pornography and child sex abuse material was a dark hidden secret.
40:42We can't just assume the friendly guy next door who looks like a good Christian man is in fact that
40:49type of person.
40:51McBurney keeps maintaining he's never done anything because the reality is he's doing a bunch of things
40:57and they're all right here in front of him. He's just got this mental block to think that he's been
41:02transformed
41:02when he hasn't. I feel better because kids are going to be saved as a result of this guy going
41:08to prison.
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