A jury found a Diamond man guilty of sexual exploitation of children and coercion or enticement of a minor today at the conclusion of a two-day trial in U. S. District Court in Springfield.
The public defenders representing Terry Lee Miksell, 65, made motions for acquittal both at the conclusion of evidence and following the announcement of the verdict, a common occurrence following a guilty verdict. Judge Rosann Ketchmark gave both sides an April 12 deadline to submit arguments.
The charges against Miksell were detailed in the probable cause affidavit filed after his initial arrest in January 2020.
Facebook initiated the CyberTips after locating sexually explicit messages and images between a user they believed to be a minor and another user believed to be a 63-year-old male. The messages and images were sent between August 13, 2019 and September 6, 2019.
In CyberTips 5638136 and 55765307 Facebook identified two user profiles. The first profile identified the user's screen name as "Terry Miksell". Miksell identified himself as a 63-year-old male in his profile. The second profile identified by Facebook was for a 16-year-old minor female.
This affiant reviewed the image he submitted and confirmed it depicted child pornography, that is Jane Doe, a minor less than 18 years of age, engaged in sexually explicit activity. The image had been sent from the minor's account to Miksell's accont during a Facebook Messenger chat.
Facebook provided an except of Facebook Messenger chats between Miksell and Jane Doe. This affiant reviewed the messages and confirmed that they are sexually explicit in nature. During the chats, Miksell asked Jane Doe to send him sexually explicit images.
Through the course of the investigation, this affiant located a 63-year-old individual named Terry Lee Miksell residing in Diamond, Missouri.
On January 3, 2020, this affiant applied for and received a search warrant for Miksell's residence located in Diamond, Newton County, Missouri.
On January 16, 2020, this affiant and other members of Homeland Security and Southwest Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force executed the search warrant for Miksell's residence.
During a post-Miranda interview with TFO Martin and TFO Charles Root, Miksell admitted to communicating with Jane Doe through Facebook and further stated he got carried away during some of his messages with Jane Doe. Miksell reported that Facebook had closed both of his accounts for violation of community standards.
Law enforcement seized numerous devices from Miksell's residence, including Miksell's Alcatel 5041C cell phone.
During law enforcement's preview of the cell phone, several pictures of Jane Doe were located in Miksell's Facebook Messenger chats. A short video depicting Jane Doe engaged in sexually explicit activity was also located.
Following the execution of the search warrant, this affiant located 16-year-old Jane Doe.
Jane Doe was interviewed by child forensic interview Kim Stewart. Jane Doe confirmed that Miksell had requested sexually explicit images and videos of her and Jane Doe stated she had sent those images and videos at his request.
6 comments:
Testimony was not allowed that Jane Doe flirted with the defendant and touched his genitals under the table with her feet at a church dinner. She's also the daughter of a former girlfriend of the defendants,who lived with the defendant for a time.the defendant was a successful substance abuse counselor for nearly twenty years, after overcoming his own addiction of many years. Something most addicts cannot do.The defendant was active in church and is a Christian. Just prior to this incident he lost two of his three daughters. One a accidental overdose and one to cancer. And his counseling job dried up due to legalization of medical marijuana. What he did was wrong. But Jane Doe was seeing a 27 year old man and having sexual relations with him and the authorities were aware of that, but he was not charged. Everyone needs to understand that this is not an innocent child. I was a law enforcement officer for 20+ years and have investigated many such cases. Most are true victims but there are some that are only victims because of the law concerning their age. Again the defendants actions were wrong. But there are always two sides to every story. The defendant has been in custody for three years awaiting trial. It's my opinion that he has paid his debt to society. But because he used a cell phone he was charged for violating a law that was initially instituted to regulate commerce between states and foreign countries. "Interstate Commerce". But under this law he can be sentenced to upwards of 30 years. This case had nothing to do with Interstate Commerce. It's a way to sentence a defendant to an inhumane length of time. This was not a violent crime. These statements are mine. They are only meant to tell the truth and only the truth. Truth sometimes gets lost when laws will not allow someone to tell the whole truth.
There are two sides to every story.
That's an awful lot of words to say that he's a pedophile. There are No circumstances where it's OK for an adult to engage in sexual activity of any kind with a child.
He is supposed to reject any kind of flirtation and remove himself from the situation. That is what adults do. I'm sure there is more to the story than even you know, and it probably isn't favorable to him. He deserves prison or worse.
Not when it's sexual exploitation of a child. Come out from behind of your unknown if you feel so strongly. But you probably won't because you don't want to be associated with a pedophile. Weird...
WRONG - IS ALWAYS WRONG - THEIR IS NO EXCUSE FOR COMMITTING A CRIME - MY DOG DIED - SO I GET TO ROB A BANK OR KILL SOMEONE - PLEASE - STOP MAKING EXCUSES FOR CRIMINALS - - ADULTS HAVE TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITIES FOR WHAT THEY DO - - THAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ADULTS AND CHILDREN - AGAIN, IF YOU COMMIT A CRIME - THEN DO THE TIME -
I AM SO TIRED OF CRIMINALS USING THE SUBSTANCE ABUSE / ALCOHOL / ETC., AS LIFE EXCUSES - - WE ALL MAKE CHOICES - IF YOU MAKE THE WRONG ONES - - BASED ON OUR LAWS THEN DO THE TIME.
I AM A CHRISTIAN, ATTEND CHURCH - - WE ARE SEEING A LOT MORE TEACHERS, MINISTERS, YOUTH / MUSIC MINISTERS AND COUNSELORS IN OUR SCHOOLS AND CHURCHES - PREYING ON CHILDREN TODAY - SO PLEASE PROTECT YOUR CHILDREN WHETHER IT BE AT CHURCH, SCHOOL, OR EVEN IN YOUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD - SOCIETY IS GOING TO HELL...
Churches need to do background checks on any person in leadership. Also, be aware of the congregates and their background. Many are sexual predators. Just because it's a church doesn't mean everyone is a saint.
I know we all have a past, but we still need to be vigilant and protect our family and friends.
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