A Simpsonville man was arrested Thursday in connection with a multi-agency child sexual exploitation investigation, state officials announced Monday. Nicholas Anthony Donrussello, 27, was charged with third-degree sexual exploitation of a minor, and he is accused of possessing child sexual abuse material.
According to WSPA 7News, officials say the case began after they received a report from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, which led them to Donrussello. Internet crimes investigators with the Greenville County Sheriff's Office made the arrest, while personnel from Attorney General Alan Wilson's Office and deputies with the Anderson County Sheriff's Office assisted in the investigation.
The station's report notes that each charge against Donrussello carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison, and the Attorney General's Office will prosecute the case going forward.
How National Tips Turn Into Local Arrests
Cases like this one typically begin far outside the Upstate. The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children's CyberTipline received 36.2 million reports related to child sexual exploitation nationwide in 2023, containing more than 105 million pieces of reported content, per missingkids.org. That same year, 7,778 of those CyberTipline reports were made available to law enforcement in South Carolina specifically, and the organization reviewed 22 submissions of child sexual exploitation material from South Carolina law enforcement.
In 2025, the CyberTipline processed more than 61.8 million images, videos, and files tied to suspected child exploitation nationwide, according to a prior Hoodline report. That same report found that Greenville County logged 35 human-trafficking and minor-exploitation investigations in 2025, the highest total among South Carolina's counties, as statewide authorities investigated more than 315 tips across 41 counties.
Other Upstate Cases Have Followed Similar Tips
Donrussello's arrest is not the first in the Upstate this year to trace back to the same national tip system. Earlier Hoodline coverage described two separate cases: Randon Linc Moss, arrested in Cherokee County on August 25, and Patrick Wells McAmish, who faces five counts of second-degree sexual exploitation of a minor in Greenville County. Officials said at the time that the two cases were unrelated, even though both stemmed from the same national tip system — a pattern that now appears to extend to Donrussello's case as well, though officials have not said the cases are connected.
Under South Carolina law, certain warrants for first-, second-, or third-degree sexual exploitation charges involving a morphed image of an identifiable minor may be issued only after a state grand jury returns a true bill of indictment, or after the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force finds probable cause in conjunction with the Attorney General's Office, according to the South Carolina Statehouse. It is not established whether that specific provision applies to the allegations against Donrussello.
