On Tuesday, August 6, 2024, the jury trial was delayed by thirty minutes as the courtroom full of potential jurors, attorneys, witnesses, and the judge, waited on the defendant, Joshua Blankenship, to arrive. It took almost two hours to pick a jury, then the trial commenced. The main witness for the State was a Cyber Crimes Analyst specializing in how images of child pornography are produced, transmitted via the Internet, and shared by individuals all over the world, including here in Roane County, Tennessee. Assistant District Attorney Jason Collver prosecutes these highly technical cases for District Attorney General Russell Johnson’s office. His desire to bring justice to the innocent, young victims in these cases is exhibited by his methodical approach, characterized by preparation and an adherence to the details.
The most difficult part of this jury trial was having to carefully and respectfully ‘publish’ just five selected images of over two hundred images of child pornography to each of the twelve members of the jury. The graphic images of young children being violated and victimized are horrifying for anyone to have to view. This is, however, absolutely necessary as the images constitute the whole of the evidence in these cases. The production, possession, sharing, and viewing of the images is the crime.
The trial was over by 4:30 pm as the jury returned a guilty as-charged verdict on five counts of Sexual Exploitation of a Minor after less than thirty minutes of deliberation. The 31-year-old Joshua Blankenship from Jacksboro, TN formerly residing in Harriman, TN faces up to twenty years in prison under Tennessee state law, if Roane County Criminal Court Judge Jeff Wicks chooses to run the sentences on each of the five charges consecutively to one another at the sentencing hearing scheduled for November 22, 2024, in Roane County Criminal Court.
The District Attorney’s Office was alerted to Blankenship’s possession of child pornography on December 15, 2019, after the Harriman Police Department (HPD) was called to a possible domestic violence situation by Blankenship’s now ex-girlfriend. When questioned, Blankenship stated to Officer Mario Foley that he and his ex-girlfriend were in a fight because he forgot to delete nude photographs of an “of-age girl.” Blankenship agreed to release his electronics to law enforcement for examination.
HPD Investigator Kent Warren transported the five electronic devices to Knox County Sheriff’s Office Cyber Crimes Investigator Eddie Wassman. Investigator Wassman conducted a forensic examination of the devices and located child sexual abuse material on three of the five devices.
At trial, HPD Officer Foley testified about his interaction with Blankship on the night of December 15, 2019. Investigator Wassman testified about the forensic examination process utilized to uncover the child sexual abuse material on his three devices. Investigator Wassman identified the five images that were found and used in the State’s case in chief.
Blankenship elected to testify in his own defense. He claimed he was seeking justice by reporting the websites that host child sexual abuse material and downloading the images when the sites he reported were not taken down. On cross-examination, it was uncovered that he downloaded countless images of child sexual abuse material and denied that he was perpetuating the victimization of children through his conduct. Furthermore, he could NOT detail any instance where he reported the images to authorities over the two years he had been downloading child pornography.
At the conclusion of the trial with a guilty verdict, the prosecution made a motion to revoke Blankenship’s bond. Judge Wicks granted the motion revoking the Defendant’s bond and remanded the Defendant into the custody of the Roane County Sheriff’s Office.
ADA Jason Collver, the Internet Crimes Against Children Prosecutor, and ADA Jonathan Edwards, the Child Sexual Abuse Prosecutor, along with the assistance of Victim Witness Coordinator Tami Bailey prosecuted this case on behalf of District Attorney Russell Johnson. Assistant Public Defender Wendal Joe Norris represented the defendant at trial.
This prosecution would not have been possible without the assistance of the Harriman Police Department and the Knox County Sheriff’s Office Cyber Crimes Unit.