TEXAS
A former congressional staffer plead Wednesday guilty to one count of receiving child pornography, officials announced today.
James Maines Jr., 54, of Mesquite, Texas, plead guilty in federal court in Dallas to one count of knowingly receiving child pornography. Maines is scheduled to be sentenced on March 16, 2016.
Maines worked for Republican Rep. Joe Barton as a deputy district director until December 2014. Maines also ran for the 11th congressional seat in Texas in 2002.
Officials said Maines admitted in court that in November 2012, he attempted to forward five child exploitation images from his email account to his U.S. House of Representatives email account.
Maines also admitted that he had received these and other child exploitation images via the Internet. Forensic analysis of Maines’s computer revealed a number of child exploitation images, some of which Maines had downloaded as early as 2004, according to authorities.