Am I Going to Prison if Convicted of Possession of Child Pornography?

I do quite a number of cases involving child pornography. Most of the time, it involves possession of child pornography, and, of course, ironically, the people who’ve been charged with possession of child pornography generally have no criminal record. So, this is the first time they’ve found themselves in my office and facing the potential of prison time, and it’s a very frightening experience, and, invariably, everyone wants to know, “If I were to be convicted, am I facing prison time,” and the answer is, “It depends,” and the reason it depends is is it going to stay on the state side or is it going to go on the federal side? For someone who has no prior convictions, no history, on the federal side, they’re facing a maximum of ten years. The reality is, depending on the number of images or videos and how long they’ve been doing this, the number of victims involved, is going toreally change that calculation on the federal side. It’s always best that this stay on the state side, and on the state side you might be facing, again, depending on the number of images, a very short jail sentence in the county jail or just probation or potentially having this charge reduced. So, again, it will depend on whether we are in federal court or, if we’re lucky, it stays in state court.