No. 21-2684 ___________________________

United States of America

Plaintiff - Appellee

v.

Christopher Lee Golden

Defendant - Appellant ____________

Appeal from United States District Court for the District of South Dakota - Western ____________

Submitted: June 17, 2022 Filed: August 17, 2022 ____________ Before GRUENDER, BENTON, and GRASZ, Circuit Judges. ____________ GRUENDER, Circuit Judge.

After a bench trial, the district court 1 convicted Christopher Golden on one count each of receipt and possession of child pornography under 18 U.S.C. § 2252A(a)(2)(A) and (5)(B) and sentenced him to 97 months’ imprisonment.

1 The Honorable Jeffrey L. Viken, United States District Judge for the District of South Dakota. Golden challenges the sufficiency of the evidence to support his convictions and the district court’s application of the sentencing guidelines. We affirm.

I.

At Golden’s trial, the United States called ten witnesses who testified to the information that follows. Golden was previously charged with the Colorado crime of sexual exploitation of children in 2014. At the time, he admitted to using child- pornography-related search terms, to using the Ares peer-to-peer filesharing program to receive child pornography, and to having a “problem dealing with child pornography.” The resulting warrant for his arrest was active until September 9, 2018, when the Pennington County, South Dakota Sheriff’s Office arrested him in Rapid City, South Dakota. The arresting officers retrieved two cellphones that belonged to Golden and found two pink socks, a doll, and a USB drive in the saddle bag of Golden’s motorcycle. A search of Golden’s residence yielded another cellphone, a laptop, an external hard drive, and a child-sized, skeleton-themed dress. Golden’s former roommate testified that Golden had been close with her prepubescent daughter whose socks were found in the saddlebag of Golden’s motorcycle. The roommate also explained that the doll was inspired by her daughter and that the skeleton-themed dress was a Halloween costume Golden had made for her daughter.

Forensic Examiner Hollie Strand conducted a forensic examination of the seized devices. Examiner Strand located four images of suspected child pornography, labelled as Exhibits 1 to 4, on one of Golden’s phones. The images were found within a “thumb data four file” from a gallery application. A thumb data four file is a data file used by a gallery application to index the “thumbnail images” in the gallery application. Images in a gallery application are created using the camera or screenshot function or from saving images located in a text message, email, or on the internet. Examiner Strand concluded that a user must have viewed these images at some point.

-2- Examiner Strand also located eight images and one video of suspected child pornography, labelled as Exhibits 5 to 13, on the external hard drive. Exhibits 5, 6, and 8 to 13 had been “last modified” on August 28 or 29, 2018. To “modify” a file on an external drive, a user must connect the drive to another device and open, view, edit, or save the file. Golden’s laptop contained the Ares filesharing program, which had last been used on August 29, 2018. The USB drive had last been connected to the laptop on August 29 or 30, 2018. Exhibit 7 was found in unallocated space, and Examiner Strand did not state when it was last accessed or modified.

Besides