Rapid City Man Sentenced to Five Years in Federal Prison for Attempted Receipt of Child Pornography

RAPID CITY - United States Attorney Ron Parsons announced today that U.S. District Judge Camela C. Theeler has sentenced a Rapid City, South Dakota, man convicted of Attempted Receipt of Child Pornography. The sentencing took place on May 19, 2026.

Eli Poorman, 20, was sentenced to five years in federal prison, followed by five years of supervised release, and ordered to pay $95 in restitution and $100 in special assessments to the Federal Crime Victims Fund. Forfeiture was also ordered.

Poorman was indicted for the charge by a federal grand jury in August 2024. He pleaded guilty on January 5, 2026.

On August 3, 2024, during the 2024 Sturgis Bike Rally, Poorman used his Reddit account to begin chatting with someone he thought was a 13-year-old girl but was, unbeknownst to Poorman, an undercover police officer. Poorman arranged to meet with what he believed would be a 13-year-old girl at his apartment to have sex in exchange for money. The same day, Poorman exited his apartment building in south Rapid City to meet with the undercover persona and was arrested by law enforcement officers. Later, investigators learned Poorman had for the previous six months been communicating on the internet with minor aged girls sending them explicit photographs of himself and seeking, in return, sexually explicit photographs of the young girls.

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 the U.S. Attorneys' Offices and the DOJ's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who exploit children, as well as identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit https://www.justice.gov/psc.

This case was investigated by the South Dakota Division of Criminal Investigation's Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, the Rapid City Police Department, and the Pennington County Sheriff's Office. Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Heather Knox prosecuted the case.

Poorman was immediately remanded to the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service.