Child porn suspect had been banned from library

A man accused of sending child pornography from a Penrose Library computer had been banned months earlier from the library district for using a Web site that links to child pornography, police said.

William James Huffstutter, a registered sex offender, was jailed earlier this month on suspicion of uploading child pornography in December to a Yahoo account.

Although he was banned from the library last summer, Huffstutter is thought to have used a computer in December that does not require a library card for access, said Colorado Springs police detective Clay Blackwell.

Investigators searched 27 Internet computers at the library Wednesday morning, looking for evidence that Huffstutter or others used them to view or send child pornography, but did not find anything new, Blackwell said.

He said library software, including a program that screens out sexual images, is apparently effective at scouring Web browsing history and keeping the computers free of unwanted images.

Huffstutter, 34, was arrested after police got a tip through the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children that Yahoo found child pornography on one of its servers posted from a library computer, Blackwell said.

The e-mail account used to upload the images was linked to Huffstutter using a cell phone number listed with the account, he said.

It was the second tip police have received this year about child pornography uploaded with a library computer, Blackwell said.

The other involved someone uploading sexual images of children and also logos for credit cards, suggesting possible material for a Web site, he said.

That case went nowhere because the library does not keep track of who has used each computer, and its network is set up so investigators cannot tell which computer within the system was used to send the illegal images, Blackwell said.

In Huffstutter’s case, information from Yahoo helped investigators connect him with the illegal images without tying him to a particular computer, Blackwell said.

Investigators also obtained a report Wednesday detailing the library’s suspicion that Huffstutter was using a special search engine July 27, 2006, that provides links to child pornography, Blackwell said.

Huffstutter was suspended in August from using any library facilities for a year, library officials said.

Dee Vazquez, a Pikes Peak Library District spokeswoman, said it is the library’s policy to report suspected crimes.

She said the library has suspended a handful of others from the library or from using its computers for looking at sexual images, but Huffstutter’s case is the only one she knows about involving possibly illegal images.

She said she did not know why last year’s case would not have been reported, though she noted documents in that instance make no mention of him viewing child pornography, only of a Web site he is suspected of visiting.

Huffstutter’s past includes a 1991 conviction for sexually assaulting a child, according to Pueblo court records.

He remains in jail on $10,000 bond.