No plea deal for Colfax man charged with 7 counts of possessing child pornography

By LeAnn R. Ralph

MENOMONIE —  A plea deal has not yet been reached for a 34-year-old Town of Colfax man charged with seven felony counts of possessing child pornography.

Chad H. Stewart appeared before Judge James Peterson October 31 with his attorney, Charles S. Huff.

Huff reported to the court that no plea deal had yet been reached and that Stewart was requesting a jury trial.

Stewart is accused of having child pornography images on his laptop computer.

According to the criminal complaint, Dunn County investigators were contacted by a Barron County detective in August of 2015. Barron County had received information from the national Center for Missing and Exploited Children of a nude child image that appeared to be a very young female that was uploaded to a website.

The Barron County detective served a subpoena to the IP holder, CenturyLink, and received information back that the IP address from which the child’s image had been uploaded belonged to a Dunn County residence at N7599 state Highway 40, Colfax.

Dunn County investigators learned that the IP address was registered to Chad Stewart.

Judge Peterson set bail for Stewart with a $1,000 signature bond in March of this year.

Stewart is scheduled for a jury trial in March of 2017.

The seven counts of possessing child pornography are Class D felonies and carry a penalty for each count of up to 25 years in prison and/or a fine of up to $100,000.