Mississippi sheriff’s deputy fired after being arrested on child porn charges

HANCOCK COUNTY, Miss. (WLOX/Gray News) - A man who was a sheriff’s deputy in Mississippi is behind bars after authorities arrested him on charges involving sexual exploitation of children.

Derrick Flanagan was arrested Friday and is now charged with two counts of exploitation of children and accessing child pornography, WLOX reported.

The Hancock County Sheriff’s Office deputy, who was terminated immediately upon his arrest on Friday, came under investigation after the sheriff’s office received a cyber-crime tip on Tuesday. That tip was forwarded to the sheriff’s office by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

After reviewing the information in the tip and its associated computer evidence, it was determined that the tip possibly involved a deputy. The sheriff’s office immediately contacted the Cyber Crimes Division of the Mississippi Attorney General’s Office and turned all of the information over to their agency for handling.

Working with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Attorney General’s Office executed arrest warrants for Flanagan. The 36-year-old was arrested Friday and booked into Hancock County Adult Detention Center.

The ongoing investigation is being conducted by the Mississippi Attorney General’s Office and the FBI.