Brendan DuBois, aged 64 and a bestselling mystery author, is being tried with six Class A felony charges in relation to the possession of child pornography. He surrendered to the police after the Exeter Police Department and the Internet Crimes Against Children Taskforce conducted a search warrant following an investigation. 

Charges and Police Affidavit Details

According to the criminal complaint, DuBois knowingly possessed at least 35 images of children engaging in sexually explicit conduct, including pictures of nude boys and girls under 18 involved in various sexual acts. Attorney Harry Starbranch of Starbranch Law represents DuBois. Starbranch suggested that the situation might involve file sharing at most.

According to Exeter Police Chief Stephan R. Poulin, the investigation began in March. Detectives from various police departments participated in the investigation. A search warrant resulted in DuBois' arrest.

Police affidavit showed that the case was launched after the authorities received a cyber tip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children regarding what appeared to be child pornography. The tip received from Google stated that the files were uploaded to the Google Drive account through DuBois's IP address.

With a search warrant, the police searched DuBois' Exeter house on Juniper Ridge Road. Although DuBois refused to talk to the investigators, his wife told them they use different computers, that their WiFi is private and protected, and that only the two have passwords.

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According to an affidavit by Exeter police Detective Bailey Teixeira, multiple items were seized from DuBois' property, including a Toshiba 1-terabyte hard drive and an Apple laptop found in his office. Axiom flagged over 5,600 images on the computer as possible child abuse content. The affidavit highlighted 20 images. Some of the images part of the 401,208 images were not flagged as child abuse content.

Teixeira estimated the ages of the children depicted to be between infancy and 12 years old. DuBois' search history revealed searches related to child pornography, including "I accidentally saved child pornography to my main Google Drive" and "How to tell if Google has reported me to the police." However, DuBois continued to access the illegal images on his hard drive.

The renowned author is currently held for preventative detention and will be arraigned at the 10th Circuit Court in Brentwood. 

Severn River Publishing Halts Sales of Brendan DuBois' Books

In response to the charges, Severn River Publishing House has removed DuBois' works from their website and suspended all promotions and sales of his books, including his latest release, "Cross Down."

Renowned for his "Lewis Cole" mystery series, DuBois signed with the publisher in 2023, granting them the rights to publish his latest novel and previous books. The publisher released a statement expressing deep concerns about the accusations and stressing their dedication to upholding the legal system, honoring their principles, and preserving confidence in the publishing industry.

In addition to his 29 bestselling novels, DuBois and James Patterson have co-authored nine more books. Among his many awards is the Short Mystery Fiction Society's Edward D. Hoch Memorial Golden Derringer for Lifetime Achievement. Additionally, he appeared on "Jeopardy" in 2012.

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