Huntley man receives probation for posting photo of juvenile girl to porn website

A Huntley man was sentenced to probation Thursday after pleading guilty to posting a revealing photo of a teenager to a pornography website.

Ryan T. Walsh, 28, accepted an offer Thursday from the McHenry County State’s Attorney’s Office and pleaded guilty to posting graphic information to a porn website. McHenry County Judge Michael Coppedge accepted the plea and sentenced Walsh to 1 1/2 years of probation.

In exchange for Walsh’s guilty plea, prosecutors agreed to dismiss additional counts of the same charge.

Huntley police arrested Walsh in May 2019, as the result of a nearly two-year investigation.

Officers were notified in July 2017 that inappropriate images of a child had been posted online, police said at the time of Walsh’s arrest.

The photos, although revealing, were not child pornography, according to a June 20, 2019, indictment.

Investigators contacted the girl in January 2018 and traced the poster’s IP address back to Walsh, police said at the time.

The girl, younger than 17 at the time, was known to Walsh but was not in a romantic relationship with the then-26-year-old, Huntley police said.

Walsh’s case originally was scheduled for a trial-by-judge set to begin Thursday afternoon.

As a condition of his sentence, Walsh must undergo a sex offender evaluation and is barred from having contact with the girl depicted in the photos.