by Tracy McCue, Sumner Newscow — The case of Steven Meisel, born in 1966, of 923 North H St. in Wellington who was charged with three counts of sexual exploitation of a child, level 5 person felonies, has had his case dismissed in Sumner County District Court so that he can be charged federally.

Meisel was apprehended on June 13 by the Wellington City Police with having downloading pornographic movie files on his HP Presario CQ56 Compaq laptop computer and at least with one file configuring it in a way so others on the Internet can download it.

Steven Meisel

On June 23, a Sumner County Court Judge dismissed the case without prejudice and court costs were suspended because Federal charges have been filed for the same incident in the United States District Court in Wichita.

On the first count of sexual exploitation of a child, the complaint said: 

“On May 9, 2014, Meisel maintained on his computer, which is password protected at his residence at 923 North H in Wellington, a movie file wherein two white males appearing to be under 16 years of age are shown nude engaging in sexual practices and said computer was configured so as to share said file with others on the Internet.”

Sumner County Attorney Kerwin Spencer said the file was discovered by a detective unit in Sedgwick County, which specializes in searching out particular Internet cases dealing in child pornography. Sedgwick County Detective Jennifer Wright downloaded said movie to her own computer through a “ARES P2P file sharing” network, the complaint said.

Spencer said once the file was discovered, a search of the IP address ensued. It was determined the physical address for the computer for which this file was distributed was located at the 923 North H address in Wellington. Sedgwick County obtained a search warrant to obtain his computer where on June 13, it was discovered that Meisel allegedly had two more private files.

Meisel has been residing in Wellington for at least two years, Spencer said.

On the second count of sexual exploitation of a child, the complaint said:

“On June 13, 2014, Meisel unlawfully stored on his computer or the attached external hard drive with a movie file wherein a female child appearing to be under age 10 performs a sexual act on an adult male and the adult male was doing so with a female part.”

On the third count of sexual exploitation of a child, the complaint said:

“Meisel stored on his computer or the attached external hard drive the separate movie file depicting two white females appearing to be under age 6 performing a sex act on an adult male.”

Meisel was ordered by the court to have no contact with anyone under the age of 16. A preliminary examination and arraignment at Sumner County court was held June 19. His appearance bond was set at $20,000.

Follow us on Twitter.