Nicholas Lane Stephens, Child Pornography, Missouri 2022

A former Joplin youth minister has been sentenced to six years in federal prison without parole for exchanging pornographic images and videos with a child victim.

Nicholas Lane Stephens, 25, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge M. Douglas Harpool on March 15, 2022, for receiving and distributing child pornography.

Stephens was formerly the youth minister at St. Paul’s United Methodist Church in Joplin. The investigation began when a Children’s Division investigator received a hotline call reporting that Stephens was involved in inappropriate relationships with minor females at the church, including the 17-year-old victim identified in court documents as ‘Jane Doe.’

Jane Doe told investigators she sent nude images to Stephens via Snapchat in December 2019. Stephens sent Jane Doe several pornographic images of himself, as well as pornographic FaceTime videos. Examiners discovered a dozen images and one video of child pornography of Jane Doe on Stephens’s cell phone. There were also numerous messages between Jane Doe and Stephens.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Ami Harshad Miller. It was investigated by the FBI, the Southwest Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force, and the Joplin, Mo., Police Department.

Stephens was sentenced to 15 years of supervised release following incarceration. The case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse.