
By Patti Weaver
(Stillwater, Okla.) — A Payne County man has been given two concurrent 25-year prison terms for molesting a friend’s 5-year-old daughter at his rural residence and possessing a large amount of child pornography on his cellular phone, in cases investigated by the Sheriff’s Office.
Kyle Andrew Blankinship, 34, was sentenced by District Judge Phillip Corley in accordance with a plea agreement with the prosecution approved in court last week.
Blankinship, who had pleaded guilty to aggravated possession of child pornography and lewd molestation, was advised by the judge that he must serve at least 85 percent of his sentence, register as a sex offender on his release from prison, provide a DNA sample, and have no contact with his victim or her family.
Blankinship has been jailed on $150,000 bail since his arrest last August after the child’s father, who had known Blankinship as a friend since they were 5 years old, talked to a deputy at the Sheriff’s Office last July, an affidavit said.
When the 5-year-old girl was asked during a forensic interview at a child advocacy center in another county on July 27, 2022, how her clothes got off of her, she said “Uncle Kyle took them off of her,” Payne County Sheriff’s Investigator Tomm Edwards wrote in an affidavit.
Payne County Sheriff’s Investigator Brandon Myers obtained a search warrant for Blankinship’s cell phone, which was digitally examined on July 25, 2022, by Payne County Sheriff’s Investigator L.A. Kellison, another affidavit said.
“I examined the device report on 8/15/2022 and located over 350 files of suspected child pornography,” that included depictions of infants, toddlers and pre-teens, Myers wrote in his affidavit.