Rochester man pleads guilty to child porn charges, to be sentenced in March

CONCORD - A Rochester man has pleaded guilty in federal court to possession of child pornography, the U.S. Attorneys Office announced on Tuesday.

According to court documents and statements made in court, in February of 2020, the Homeland Security Investigations New Hampshire office received information that on April 28, 2019, an individual originating from an IP address at a Rochester residence had accessed a website known for sharing child sexual abuse and exploitation material. Michael A Clemence, 36, was identified as the subscriber of the target IP address.

On May 26, agents conducted a consensual interview with Clemence. They advised him they were investigating internet activity associated with child exploitation material and that some of the activity occurred in April of 2019 from the IP address associated with his previous address.

Clemence made no admissions but volunteered that his wife had previously found disturbing material on their home computer and that they subsequently wiped the computer's hard drive and gave the computer away.

Clemence's wife later confirmed that in May of 2019, she discovered thousands of images of what appeared to be child exploitation material on Clemence's laptop computer.

After further investigation, a search warrant was executed at Clemence's residence, which resulted in the seizure of numerous electronic devices. Forensic examination of the devices confirmed the presence of child exploitation material. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children identified 1,351 images as depicting known minor victims.

Clemence is scheduled to be sentenced on March 21.