A 64-year-old Shawnee man is facing five felony counts after investigators say he used an artificial intelligence app to create child sexual abuse material, in a case that Oklahoma's top law enforcement agency says shows how quickly this kind of crime is evolving. Darvin Hill was arrested by Shawnee police and charged with possessing and creating child pornography using an AI application, with a first court appearance scheduled for Tuesday at the Pottawatomie County Courthouse.
The case came together after the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation's Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force was tipped off through a national database in August, according to OSBI
. State agents alerted Shawnee police, who executed a search warrant at Hill's home. Investigators say they found more than 200 child sexual abuse images and videos spread across two separate phones, including about 100 images that appeared to have been created through an AI app.
OSBI Special Agent Blaine Phillips sat down with News 9 to walk through how these investigations unfold. Phillips discussed AI-generated images. He also said investigators can trace files to a specific locality. AI-generated child pornography is illegal, and children whose likenesses are used can be victimized.
How Investigators Say the Images Were Made
According to the seed reporting that originated with News 9, police believe Hill used pictures of children in his own community to generate the illegal material, and investigators believe he used a photo of a neighbor taken from the neighbor's front porch. Police also identified some young victims through selfies the children had posted on social media, per the report. Prosecutors in Pottawatomie County have since filed the five felony counts against Hill.
AI-generated images can sometimes be a mash-up pulling from multiple children's photos at once, but children whose likenesses are used can be victimized. AI-generated child sexual abuse material is illegal.
Oklahoma Law and a Wider National Push
Oklahoma lawmakers passed legislation making AI-generated child sexual abuse material illegal. The state has continued building out its legal response since then: Governor Kevin Stitt signed House Bill 1364 on May 5, 2025, prohibiting the nonconsensual sharing of AI-generated sexual images, according to Digital Policy Alert. Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond has also pushed federal lawmakers to study the issue directly, as reported by KRCRTV, urging Congress to examine how artificial intelligence is being used to exploit children.
The concern isn't limited to Oklahoma. The issue has drawn alarm and enforcement actions involving AI sexual imagery, according to KFOR and the Associated Press.
Other cases illustrate how unsettled the legal landscape still is. An Ohio man became the first person convicted under the Take It Down Act after pleading guilty to using AI to generate child sexual abuse material, according to KSWO. That same report noted that two teenage boys in Pennsylvania received probation for creating explicit AI images of classmates at a private school, and three Tennessee teenagers have sued Elon Musk's xAI, alleging its Grok tools turned their real photos into sexually explicit images.
For Shawnee, the case against Hill now moves into the Pottawatomie County court system, where his first appearance is set for Tuesday.
