D.C. Pediatrician Sentenced to 18 Months for Child Pornography Possession

A long-time D.C. pediatrician was sentenced to 18 months in prison and fined $10,000 Tuesday, three months after pleading guilty to a federal charge of possession of child pornography.

Dr. Robert Dickey was arrested in May after the FBI raided his office on 38th Street SE.

Agents say the 74-year-old pediatrician was watching child pornography when they stormed in to search his home and office. They seized multiple electronic devices from Dickey's home and office, including a desktop computer and an additional hard drive that contained about 132 images of child pornography.

There was no indication the images involved his patients, authorities said.

Dickey admitted to law enforcement agents that he had visited child pornography sites, downloaded child pornography and stored it on an external hard drive, the police documents say.

"This case is extremely troubling because a beloved pediatrician was downloading child pornography in the same home where he was providing medical treatment to children," said U.S. Attorney Ronald L. Machen. "He provided care to many children during his career, but also obsessively collected images of children of the same ages being sexually exploited."

The investigation began in April when Microsoft alerted the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children that someone with a Microsoft Outlook email address and the user name Robert Dickey uploaded about 14 images of child pornography, authorities said.

After his prison term, Dickey will be placed on 10 years of supervised release and will be required to register as a sex offender for 15 years.

He had faced a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

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