ODESSA, Texas — A West Texas school bus driver remains in federal custody following his June 19 arrest for possessing child pornography.
This arrest resulted from a joint investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), and the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS).
Reid Derrick Witcher, 45, was arrested after authorities executed a state search warrant at his Odessa home. According to the filed federal criminal complaint, Witcher said he has been downloading and viewing child pornography for about 10 years, and he possessed about 100,000 images of child pornography contained in electronic media. Agents found a binder inside Witcher’s house that contained about 125 photos of child pornography.
“Innocent children who are sexually exploited physically or through disseminated child pornography may suffer irreparable trauma,” said Jack P. Staton, special agent in charge of HSI El Paso. “Under our ongoing Operation Predator program, our HSI special agents continue to work jointly with our law enforcement partners to rescue victimized children, and aggressively target child predators for their heinous crimes.”
This investigation was conducted under HSI’s Operation Predator, an international initiative to protect children from sexual predators. Since the launch of Operation Predator in 2003, HSI has arrested more than 19,000 individuals for crimes against children, including the production and distribution of online child exploitation material, traveling overseas for sex with minors, and sex trafficking of children. In fiscal year 2018, more than 3,000 child predators were arrested by HSI special agents under this initiative and more than 850 victims were identified or rescued.
