Tip from Google leads to arrest of St. Augustine man for child pornography

ST. JOHNS COUNTY, Fla. — A St. Augustine man has been arrested and is accused of possessing child pornography.

Deputies said they were able to track the man down through his activity on Google.

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The St. Johns County Sheriff’s Office was officially able to arrest 67-year-old Donnie Pearce this week after seizing more than 15 devices back in March. The investigation Started with a tip from Google.

Deputies say Pearce was arrested and charged with 13 counts of possession of obscene material after Google tracked him uploading 38 images of child sexual abuse.

Deputies went through his search history to find the material.

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“There is no privacy with Google,” Action News Jax Law and Safety expert Dale Carson said.

Carson, who has decades of law enforcement experience and is a former FBI agent, said websites hold a lot of your previous search history.

“When you use a website like Google, Facebook, even Twitter, those websites hold a certain amount of domain over the information you publish,” Carson said.

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According to the report obtained by Action News Jax, the investigation started in November 2020 when Google sent Pearce’s name, telephone and email addresses to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

“So there’s no restriction on anything you give to Google, Facebook, Twitter, or any, any of those software programs. It’s not in control by any aspect of privacy,” Carson said.

That kind of access may seem alarming, but Google having the ability to flag that information was the tool that led to Pearce’s arrest.

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