8th Circuit upholds Tyler Denby's 262-month sentence for child pornography crimes, rejecting challenges to his…

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United States Court of Appeals For the Eighth Circuit ___________________________ No. 24-3483 ___________________________ United States of America Plaintiff - Appellee v. Tyler Denby Defendant - Appellant ____________ Appeal from United States District Court for the District of Nebraska ____________ Submitted: November 18, 2025 Filed: July 17, 2026 ____________ Before BENTON, GRASZ, and STRAS, Circuit Judges. ____________ GRASZ, Circuit Judge. Law enforcement in Alliance, Nebraska, stopped Tyler Denby after receiving a report that he had threatened a local resident. As Denby sat in his vehicle, an officer saw a marijuana pipe in his pocket, prompting a search of Denby’s vehicle and person. In the vehicle, investigators discovered electronic devices, children’s effects, and a collection of girls’ underwear, so they obtained a search warrant for several SD cards found on Denby’s person. They observed child pornography on the SD cards, and Denby later confessed to possessing the child pornography and transporting it across state lines. At trial, a jury convicted Denby of transporting child pornography and possessing prepubescent child pornography, after which the district court1 sentenced him to 262 months of imprisonment. Denby appeals, and we affirm. I. Background Two Alliance Police Department officers, Officer Dani Campbell and Sergeant James Grumbles, began investigating a report from two callers that an individual armed with a knife had harassed them before driving off. Later that day, Box Butte County Sheriff Tammy Mowry was driving by a gas station in Alliance when someone waved her down to report that “he was in an altercation with an individual” who was “threatening him.” Mowry relayed the incident to the Alliance Police Department before approaching the individual and identifying him as Denby. While waiting for Alliance officers to respond, she casually conversed with Denby as he sat in his car. Within a few minutes, Campbell and Grumbles arrived at the scene because they heard Denby’s description over the radio and matched it with the one given by the two callers earlier in the day. At that point, Mowry asked for Denby’s car keys, and he gave them to her. Campbell then noticed a marijuana pipe in Denby’s pocket and decided to search his vehicle and person. During the search, officers found cell phones, camcorders, flash drives, SD cards, a laptop, a teddy bear with a blonde hair on it, a child’s bracelet, and a pillowcase containing a collection of stained children’s panties and training bras. Upon finding the girls’ underwear, Campbell read Denby his Miranda rights and inquired about the underwear. Denby responded that he had a panty fetish. Denby’s mother later arrived, informed officers that Denby had a traumatic brain injury, and requested that they take him to the hospital for a mental evaluation. At the hospital, 1 The Honorable Susan M. Bazis, United States District Judge for the District of Nebraska. -2- Denby behaved irrationally, referencing conspiracy theories, making lewd remarks, and exhibiting paranoia that his urine would be collected without his knowledge. In Denby’s hospital records, staff noted that he was found with “items concerning for child abuse/pornography,” and so no psychiatric facilities would take him due to “his pending child pornography allegation.” Eventually, Alliance Investigator David LaDuke came to speak with Denby at the hospital. However, Denby told LaDuke, “I plead the Fifth,” so LaDuke left. Later that evening, LaDuke learned from an investigator in Montana that two 14-year-old girls had separately accused Denby of drugging and raping them in 2020. LaDuke then applied for a warrant to search Denby’s electronic devices and storage media. In the warrant affidavit, LaDuke included the Montana rape allegations, stating that one 14-year-old “positively identified Denby as being the individual who had raped her” and the other “reported . . . that she had been drugged and raped by Denby.” After obtaining the warrant, LaDuke discovered child pornography on several of Denby’s SD cards. Several months later, Denby submitted a request from jail to speak with Mowry, Grumbles, and LaDuke. LaDuke and Grumbles then visited Denby, who told them he wanted to work as a confidential informant. During the conversation, LaDuke Mirandized Denby and eventually asked him about his involvement with child pornography. Denby then gave a detailed confession in which he also claimed that he was obtaining child pornography “samples” so he could report the sellers to law enforcement. LaDuke later initiated a second interview to ask Denby if he transported child pornography across state lines. After being Mirandized again, Denby confessed. Just before the pretrial motion deadline, Denby moved to suppress all the evidence found in his car and his confessions, but the district court denied the motion after a hearing. Fifteen months later, Denby moved to reopen the suppression -3- hearing based on newly acquired evidence, but a magistrate judge 2 denied that motion as untimely and futile. With trial on the horizon, Denby then moved in limine to exclude — among other things — evidence of the girls’ underwear, his panty fetish, the teddy bear, the bracelet, and the Montana rape accusations. The district court denied his motion as to the underwear, but it excluded the other evidence. At trial, Denby also objected to evidence of the cell phones, camcorders, and laptop found in his car by cross-referencing his previous motions, but the district court overruled those objections. Following Denby’s conviction, the district court sentenced him to the bottom of the Guidelines range, noting his mental health issues but finding that he failed to accept responsibility and was “at high risk to re-offend.” Denby now appeals his conviction and sentence. II. Analysis On appeal, Denby challenges (1) the district court’s failure to evaluate, sua sponte, his competency to stand trial; (2) his counsels’ failure to move for a competency evaluation; (3) the denial of his pretrial motion to suppress the evidence from his vehicle and his custodial statements; (4) the denial of his motion to reopen the suppression hearing; (5) the admission of certain evidence at trial; and (6) the substantive reasonableness of his sentence. These issues broadly revolve around four topics: Denby’s competency, suppression motion, evidentiary objections, and sentence. We address each in turn. A. Competency Denby first argues the district court should have ordered a competency evaluation for him on its own motion. We review the district court’s “decision not to hold a competency hearing or order a competency evaluation for an abuse of discretion.” United States v. Luscombe, 950 F.3d 1021, 1027 (8th Cir. 2020). Since 2 The Honorable Jacqueline M. DeLuca, United States Magistrate Judge for the District of Nebraska. -4- convicting an incompetent person violates due process, a “defendant must be competent at all stages of [the] prosecution, including sentencing.” United States v. Casteel, 717 F.3d 635, 640–41 (8th Cir. 2013) (quoting U

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