A man was recently sentenced to 60 years in federal prison for filming himself as he molested a 7-year-old child. As announced by the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas, Chad E. Meacham, Mark Alan Miller was given the statutory maximum sentence on September 8 after he pleaded guilty to the crime in March. He was indicted in June 2020.
The case was jointly investigated by the Rockwall Police Department, the FBI’s Dallas Field Office, and the Rockwall County Sheriff’s Office. Court records state that police were called to the victim’s home on January 12, 2020. The victim’s father had walked in on the 35-year-old defendant raping his daughter, who was 9 years old at the time.
The father told authorities that he and Miller had been friends for over 10 years, and the latter was staying overnight in his home. The father said he heard a noise, and when he went to check, he noticed that Miller was not in the living room where he was supposed to be sleeping. He rushed to his daughter’s room, and that was where he found his friend anally raping his daughter.
The father held a gun on Miller until police arrived at the home. Per court documents, Miller immediately admitted that he had been sexually touching the child for years.
“A little too close” was what he called their relationship.
The girl in question was quickly taken to the hospital, after which she was taken to the Rockwall Children’s Advocacy Center. She confirmed that the incident was not the first and that Miller had raped her multiple times. She also said Miller had photographed her genitals and had shown her the photos.
Officers interrogated Miller regarding the photos, and he admitted to producing child pornography. A forensic analysis of his electronic devices was then conducted, showing that he had produced up to five videos and 132 images of child pornography involving the victim. It was also disclosed in court that Miller used a revealing image of the victim as his phone’s screen saver.
The videos and photos date back two years to when the child was 7 years old.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Camille Sparks, who prosecuted the case, said in court that the girl involved in this case was not Miller’s only victim. At the sentencing hearing before U.S. District Judge Jane J. Boyle, a forensic analyst from the Rockwall Police Department testified that Miller’s electronic devices had more than 8,000 sexually explicit images of other children.