ANCHORAGE, Alaska – A former Ketchikan church elder pleaded guilty earlier this week to possessing child pornography of a child under the age of 12. According to court documents, in May 2024, relatives of Dwight John, 74, contacted the Ketchikan Police Department after they found a USB drive that contained what they thought was child sexual abuse material (CSAM). At the time of discovery, John was serving a sentence in Alaska state prison for sexually abusing a minor. A law enforcement officer reviewed the photos on the USB drive and found numerous sexually explicit images of a 10-year old girl known to John through an institution located in Mexico. Law enforcement officers later searched John’s cell phones and laptop computer, where they discovered dozens of sexually explicit photos of the minor victim and over 1,000 images of CSAM depicting prepubescent minors, including infants and toddlers. John admitted to producing sexually explicit photographs of the minor victim during his trips to Mexico in 2018 and 2019. John was charged through Operation Relentless Justice in late 2025, a coordinated enforcement effort to identify, track and arrest child sex predators. He is scheduled to be sentenced on December 16, 2026, and faces between 10 to 15 years in prison. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
“Dwight Chris John repeatedly exploited a vulnerable child in Mexico and engaged in the exploitation of children online in Alaska,” said Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division. “Yesterday’s guilty plea is an important step toward justice for these children. We will hold U.S. citizens accountable wherever they exploit children.” “Mr. John’s behavior was reprehensible, and his crimes were committed against some of the most vulnerable members of our community,” said U.S. Attorney Michael J. Heyman. “My office remains steadfastly committed to protecting children and will aggressively pursue those engaging in such repulsive conduct.” “Demonstrated by his reprehensible pattern of conduct involving online child exploitation, Mr. John posed a significant threat to children in Alaska and abroad,” said Special Agent in Charge Matthew Schlegel of the FBI Anchorage Field Office. “Protecting children is one of the FBI’s highest priorities. Together with our law enforcement partners, we will continue to pursue and hold accountable anyone who exploits our most vulnerable.”
The FBI Anchorage Field Office, Juneau Resident Agency investigated the case, with assistance from the Ketchikan Police Department, as part of the FBI’s Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jack Schmidt and Trial Attorney Rachel L. Rothberg of the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS) are prosecuting the case.
This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys' Offices and CEOS, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit Justice.gov/PSC.