California beauty queen found guilty of child porn charges

A California beauty queen has been found guilty of possessing child pornography and sentenced to 300 days in jail.

Meghan Breanna Alt, 27, who won the Mrs Orange County crown in 2014, pleaded guilty to lewd acts with a child as well as possessing pornographic images of a child in a county court on Friday (21 April).

She had taken explicit pictures of a four-year-old between January and October of 2015 and passed them along to other people in return for money, the LA Times reported the prosecution as saying.

However, two further counts of lewd acts with a child were dismissed by prosecutors, the Associated Press reported.

The crime was discovered after Alt forwarded the photographs to a marine and the incident was discovered by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service – prompting a criminal investigation into what happened and, subsequently, Alt's arrest.

In addition to serving 300 days in jail, Alt will spend three years on probation, attend a child abusers treatment programme and perform 15 days of community service

She is not currently being held in jail and has been ordered to report to the Orange County Jail on 28 April to begin serving her prison sentence.