Rochester Hills Man Facing Child Pornography​ Charges: Officials

ROCHESTER HILLS, MI — A Rochester Hills man is in trouble after federal officials said they found child pornography on the same computer he used to store his tax return information, according to a criminal complaint.

Jason James Smith, 42, is facing charges of possessing and distributing child pornography and other related materials, according to a criminal complaint.

Smith was previously arrested for second-degree criminal sexual conduct out of Waterford Township in 2004, according to a criminal complaint. That case involved a person under 13 years old, according to court records.

Federal officials said they began investigating Smith after they found numerous files containing abusive child sex material from an IP address in Rochester Hills between May and August 2022.

On June 9, Homeland Security investigators in Grand Rapids were watching people sharing the files when they came across a file that had been partially downloaded to that Rochester Hills IP address, according to the criminal complaint.

The video showed two young girls, between the ages of 12-14 and 6-8, performing numerous sexual acts on each other, according to the criminal complaint.

Federal officials obtained a search warrant after tracing the downloaded file to a Rochester Hills address associated with Smith, according to the criminal complaint.

On Aug. 31, federal officials searched the house and found numerous computers that had downloaded files containing child pornography, according to the criminal complaint. Some of the computers were found in the home's basement, federal officials said.

Smith’s wife and stepson told officials that the computers in the basement belonged to Smith and weren’t used by anyone else, according to the criminal complaint.

The hard drives with the downloaded child pornography also had tax return information on W-2s and 1099s for a business that Smith owned and operated, officials said.