ASHEVILLE, N.C. – Logan Pierce Plowucha, 21, of Leicester, North Carolina, was sentenced to nine years in prison followed by a lifetime of supervised release today for distributing child sexual abuse material (CSAM), announced Russ Ferguson, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. Plowucha was also ordered to register as a sex offender when he is released from prison.
According to filed court documents, in August 2025, Plowucha began communicating with an undercover HSI agent in an online chatroom dedicated to the exchange of CSAM and discussions of the sexual exploitation of children. Between August and September 2025, during his communications with the HSI agent, Plowucha used an encrypted messaging app to distribute CSAM to the undercover agent, including videos depicting prepubescent minors being sexually abused, including infants and bestiality. In September 2025, Plowucha met with an HSI undercover agent. During the meeting the undercover agent observed that Plowucha had CSAM files on his cellphone and online. Plowucha was arrested on the same day. During an interview with law enforcement, Plowucha admitted that he had been sending CSAM to the undercover agent. A forensic examination of the defendant’s phone revealed that Plowucha had more than 1,400 CSAM videos and images.
Plowucha remains in the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service until he is transferred to the custody of the Federal Bureau of Prisons upon designation of a federal facility.
In making the announcement U.S. Attorney Russ Ferguson commended the HSI Greenville Office, the U.S. Marshals Service Carolinas Regional Fugitive Task Force, and the Waynesville Police Department for their work on this case.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Alexis Benjamin of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Asheville prosecuted the case.
This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse, launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS), Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit https://www.justice.gov/psc .
Source: U.S. Attorney’s Office — Western District of North Carolina — U.S. Department of Justice press release.