A Vancouver man stands accused of possessing thousands of images of child pornography and pressuring a 13-year-old girl into sending him nude photos.
Alan Donald Higgs, 60, was in Clark County Superior Court on Thursday and Friday to face allegations of first-degree possessing depictions of a minor engaged in sexually explicit conduct, felony communicating with a minor for immoral purposes and sexual exploitation of a minor.
Higgs is accused of messaging a girl, who lives in Maine, in October and asking her to send nude photos. He subsequently received multiple images, according to an affidavit of probable cause filed in support of the allegations.
Facebook reported the activity to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, which alerted law enforcement, the affidavit states.
Investigators obtained a search warrant and received messages exchanged on Facebook between Higgs and the girl. They also obtained his Google Drive cloud storage account and found child pornography images and messages sent and received between March 2016 and June 2017, court records allege.
During a search of his residence, investigators seized five digital storage cards. Higgs told detectives that there was child pornography on the cards but said he solicited the images from social media sites with the intent of informing police of the illegal activity, according to a separate probable cause affidavit.
One card contained approximately 2,850 images of child pornography. Another contained about 77 images. All of the images had been deleted from the cards but were recovered, the affidavit said.
Investigators also found that Higgs had used his phone to record video of child pornography from a computer screen, the court document states.
Higgs’ bail was set at a total of $75,000 Friday. He will be arraigned Sept. 7.
