LOGAN — A 67-year-old Logan man was arrested for allegedly editing and possessing child pornography. Vern Evan Buist was booked briefly into the Cache County Jail, Oct. 23.
According to an arrest affidavit, the Logan City Police Department received a cyber-tip from Google on July 2. The tip advised that a Google user had uploaded apparent child sexual abuse material to their account.
Google submitted 10 files with the tip. Police found two of the files included images of male children, 12-14 years old, whose clothing had been edited off, so the children appeared nude. Adult male genitals had been edited onto the children.
On July 16, officers obtained a warrant for Google and received 33,400 images associated with the account. 20,274 were nude images, according to the probable cause statement.
Police reported that most of the images were of nude males. Many of the images were photoshopped, by putting other people’s faces over the original face. The images had males being tied up and having ropes around their necks.
The images included males engaged in various sexual activities. Many of the victims looked young and had smaller bodies. There were also hundreds of photos of young male children, some clothed, others shirtless and posing. Some of the children had edited nooses around the children’s neck. The children ranged from 6-17 years old, court documents detailed.
On Oct. 23, police served a search warrant on Buist’s residence. They found a noose tied up in a closet along with multiple electronic devices inside the home.
While being questioned at the police department, Buist reportedly confirmed his Google account and admitted to editing many of the photos using software found on his computer, including at least one of the edited photos of children with adult genitals. Referring to some of the pictures, he told police that it wasn’t illegal or hurting anyone by having them.
According to jail records, Buist was booked on suspicion of six counts of sexual exploitation of a minor and three counts of aggravated sexual exploitation of a minor for producing the child sexual abuse material. He was later released pending arraignment on formal charges in Logan’s 1st District Court.
Individuals arrested and charged in complaints are presumed innocent unless or until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in court.