United States v. Dennis Burkholder

I. Background and Procedural History

Between November and December 2006, Burkholder pur- chased subscriptions to at least two commercial internet sites that offered child pornography to their members. Law enforcement discovered Burkholder’s memberships and obtained a search warrant for his home. Burkholder cooper- ated with the search, telling the agents that he downloaded the pictures to his computer and deleted the pictures after saving many on compact discs. In total, Burkholder possessed more than 600 images of child pornography. In January 2008, a fed- eral grand jury indicted Burkholder, charging him with one count of possession of child pornography in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2252A(a)(5)(B). Burkholder pleaded guilty pursuant UNITED STATES v. BURKHOLDER 611 to a plea agreement, and the court ordered preparation of a PSR before the September 2008 sentencing hearing.

The PSR was disclosed on August 6, 2008, and included summaries of two written victim impact statements (the let- ters). Although the PSR stated that copies of the letters were attached to the PSR, copies of the letters were included only with the PSR sent to the district court. And though the…