PROVO, Utah, June 23, 2019 (Gephardt Daily) — A Provo man is facing multiple charges after police said he both possessed child pornography and abused an 8-year-old girl for three years.
A probable cause statement from Utah County said Duke Norvel Dayton, 78, was arrested June 17 and was initially facing 20 charges of sexual exploitation of a minor, a second-degree felony.
The arresting officer, a Provo Police SVU detective, received information from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children regarding child pornography being downloaded through the Internet, the statement said.
Through the investigation, the arresting officer found the IP address being used to download the child pornography returned to an address in Provo with the IP subscriber was identified as Duke Dayton, the statement said. The officer observed a pornographic image which was downloaded by the IP address which belonged to Dayton. It was the same image downloaded four separate times.
A search warrant was obtained for Dayton’s residence and the Provo Police SVU unit along with multiple other local and federal agencies executed the search warrant. Dayton was the only occupant of the residence.
After being read his Miranda rights, Dayton told officers his Wi-Fi name which was secured using a password.
“Dayton admitted to downloading child pornography using his computer,” the statement said. “Dayton admitted he has been sexually attracted to young children for several years and had been downloading and viewing images of naked children for years.”
Detectives previewed an external hard drive attached to Dayton’s computer which he admitted to downloading the child pornography with.
Upon viewing the hard drive, the arresting officer located a folder containing child pornography images. A total of 20 images were found showing young girls between the ages of 2 and 11 in suggestive poses. Some had captions including: “This is what real woman looks like (heart) Support pedophilia because molest is best.”
Based upon the small number of images the officer previewed on the external hard drive device and the number of images on the device, along with the actual computer Dayton was using to download child pornography images, it is believed there will be hundreds of images of child pornography once the drive and computer are forensically previewed, the statement said.
Bail for Dayton was set at $200,000.The arresting officer wrote: “behavior with downloading child pornography and his sexual attraction to young children has been going on for several years per his own words. Therefore your affiant is concerned Dayton will continue his behavior if a high bail is not given and he bails out.”
However, Dayton did bail out, and, according to a subsequent probable cause statement, then attempted to contact a child who he had been abusing for three years.
On June 19, Dayton’s birthday, he was arrested again and is facing eight charges of sex abuse of a child, a second-degree felony.
The second probable cause statement said that while the search warrant was being executed on June 17, an 8-year-old female came to the residence. Dayton told officers the girl lived next door and he babysat her often.
“A Provo SVU Detective spoke with the child’s mother and asked her to talk to the child about body safety,” the statement said. “Later, in the day the child disclosed to her mother without even being talked to first or asked that Dayton had touched her on her private parts and had touched her a lot. The child disclosed to her mom Dayton touched her private parts underneath her pants and underwear.”
The child also told her mom Dayton had told her not to tell anyone.
The child’s mother then said that after being bailed out, Dayton came to their residence.
“The child’s mother said Dayton came to their residence because they live next door and knocked on their front door,” the statement said. “The mother, the child and her other siblings went and hid because they were scared of Dayton.”
Dayton then sent a text message to the older sister of the child asking if the child was home. Dayton also attempted to call the child’s mother’s phone.
A forensic interview was set up at the Provo Children’s Justice Center to speak with the child.
“During the interview when I asked the child why she was there to talk to me, she disclosed Dayton has been touching her private parts,” the statement said. “When I asked the child about the first time she remembers Dayton touching her private parts she said it happened when she was 5 years old.”
During the interview the child reiterated that Dayton touched her under her clothes. The child disclosed Dayton “would touch her private parts almost every time she would go to his house.” The child told officers Dayton would tell her not to tell anyone.
In the previous case of possession of child pornography where Dayton was booked on 20 counts of sexual exploitation of a minor, upon reviewing his cell phone data download Dayton had a substantial number of pictures of the victim in this case on his phone, the statement said.
Dayton is now being held at the Utah County Jail with no bail.
