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Eric Robert Smith, who was charged in December of 2023 with 20 counts related to child pornography, was sentenced Thursday to nearly nine years in prison.

Smith, 59, was convicted of a single count of possession of pornographic work as a registered predatory offender in Mower County District Court and sentenced to 105 months in prison or just under nine years.

He was given credit for 391 days served and all other remaining charges of possessing pornographic work of minors under 14 and as a predatory offender, were dismissed. He will serve his prison sentence at the Minnesota Correctional Facility in St. Cloud.

According to official court documents, Smith was arrested on Dec. 8, 2023, on a warrant for violating conditions of his release put down by the Minnesota Department of Corrections, though the document did not mention what that violation was.

During the initial arrest, Smith’s cellphone was seized by the DOC and an initial search of phone turned up suspected child sexual abuse material (CSAM). 

A detective for the Austin Police Department was notified, who obtained a search warrant for the phone, which was sent to the Rochester Police Department Technology Forensic Unit for examination.  

The detective later examined the phone data on Dec. 18. According to court documents, the phone contained 19 files containing CSAM. Of those, five depicted victims identified by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

The 19 files depicted children as old as 12 and as young as six.

A deeper look through court records shows that Smith was convicted of a pair of cases in Fillmore County in 2005 in which he was charged with criminal sexual conduct with a victim under 13-years-old.

He received prison sentences of 144 and 21 months that ran concurrently in those cases and was fined $6,000.