Plainfield Man Gets 6 Years For Online Child Porn

A Plainfield man pleaded guilty to child pornography on Monday and was sentenced to six years in prison for filming and attempting to run away with a teenage girl.

Mark D. Darragh Jr., 23, of 2504 Labrecque Dr. in the southwest suburb pleaded guilty to one count of child pornography and one count of child abduction, according to a release from the Will County State's Attorney's office. He was sentenced to four years for child pornography and two additional years for child abduction, and must also register for the rest as a sex offender.

The case was jointly prosecuted by the state's attorney's Computer Crimes Unit and the Illinois Attorney General's High Tech Crimes Bureau.

In March 2006, Darragh, 21 at the time, used his Webcam to film and broadcast over the Internet a 16-year-old girl performing a sexual act, the release said. He had met the girl on MySpace.com.

While free on bond in May 2006, Darragh again was arrested, this time after he attempted to meet with a 15-year-old Plainfield girl, the release said. During on-line conversations with that girl, he agreed to take her to California in exchange for sex, but the victim's mother contacted police when she became aware of the plan.

"Mark Darragh is exactly the kind of online predator I have been warning parents about for years," State's Attorney James Glasgow said in the release. "Allowing a child unsupervised access to the Internet and a MySpace.com account can be as dangerous as leaving them in a room with a loaded gun."