Rock Hill man took voyeur pictures, sexually exploited child. He’s headed to prison
A Rock Hill man who had child porn and took pictures of a victim in a bathroom has been sentenced to 18 years in prison.
Richard Henry Austin III, 35, pleaded guilty Monday in York County criminal court to first-degree sexual exploitation of a minor and voyeurism, said Robert Kittle of the S.C. Attorney General’s Office. Austin was sentenced to 18 years by South Carolina Circuit Court Judge Bill McKinnon.
Austin was arrested in June 2019 by York County Sheriff’s Office sex crimes detective Alex Clark, according to arrest warrants and court documents. Digital pornography of children as young as three years old were found on the phone, according to the arrest warrants.
Austin pleaded guilty under an Alford plea, Kittle said. In an Alford plea in South Carolina, a defendant accepts the punishment of a guilty plea without admitting guilt by accepting that if the case went to trial, he would likely be found guilty, prosecutors said.
The case was prosecuted by Camille Guthrie with the South Carolina Attorney General’s office Internet Crimes Against Children task force.
The task force uses local, state, and federal police agencies against offenders who target children online, according to the attorney general.
