A Hunterdon County, New Jersey man today admitted distributing images of child sexual abuse over the Internet, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced.
John Livoti, 42, of Hampton, New Jersey, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Joel A. Pisano in Trenton federal court to an information charging him with one count of distribution of child pornography. Livoti is currently in federal custody.
Livoti admitted that from May 2011 through February 2012 he used peer-to-peer file sharing software to download and to share images of child pornography through the Internet. He accessed the Internet through his neighbor’s wireless Internet connection. He further admitted that for a period of time in 2011, he paid for a minor, living in another state, to access the peer-to-peer network so that the minor could access child pornography.
Special agents of the FBI and other law enforcement executed a search warrant at Livoti’s apartment in Hampton, New Jersey, on February 2, 2012. Law enforcement seized a netbook computer and an external hard drive that contained child pornography.
Because of his prior convictions for sexual assault and for possession of child pornography, the count of distributing child pornography to which Livoti pleaded guilty is punishable by a mandatory minimum penalty of 15 years in prison and a maximum potential penalty of 40 years and a $250,000 fine. Sentencing is scheduled for November 15, 2012.
Cincinnati, OH
A veteran Cincinnati police officer is accused of possessing child pornography.
Authorities
said 42-year-old Randolph Grote resigned from the Cincinnati department
this week and was indicted by a federal grand jury.
They
say images of child pornography were found on his computer and storage
devices last year during a national sex crimes investigation.
The Cincinnati Enquirer ( http://cin.ci/PqqEsV ) reports that Grote is a former Hamilton County probation officer who joined the Cincinnati police department in 2003.
Earlier this week, Jeremy Lee Klepperich, a 28-year-old registered
sex offender from Woodland Township in central Minnesota, was charged by
way of federal criminal complaint with possessing child pornography.
The complaint alleges that between April 21, 2011, and June 2, 2012,
Klepperich possessed a computer, thumb drives, and a cell phone that
contained visual depictions of minors engaged in sexually explicit
conduct. Klepperich was held in the Wright County, Minnesota jail until
today, when he was transferred to federal custody following his initial
appearance in federal court.
On July 6, 2012, a month after Klepperich was arrested by local law enforcement officers for violating the terms of his 2011 stay of sentence, an unnamed individual informed authorities of a computer thumb drive allegedly belonging to Klepperich that contained child pornography. A subsequent forensic examination of that thumb drive yielded approximately 4,270 images and 56 videos of child pornography. That review led to additional investigation and resulted in the federal charges now filed.
Klepperich’s criminal history includes a 1997 McLeod County, Minnesota conviction for sexual penetration of the minor female he was babysitting and a 2009 conviction in Hennepin County for failure to register as a predatory offender.
New Orleans, LA
QUENTIN KITTEL, age 21, a resident of Slidell, Louisiana, was sentenced today by United States District Judge Jane Triche Milazzo to five years in prison, followed by eight years of supervised release after previously pleading guilty to crimes involving the sexual exploitation of children, announced United States Attorney Jim Letten. Specifically, KITTEL had previously pleaded guilty to two counts of receiving images depicting the sexual exploitation and victimization of children. KITTEL will also have to register as a sex offender.
According to courts documents, between fall 2009 and October 2011, KITTEL met two juvenile females, the first of whom was 16 years old and the second of whom was 12 years old. After meeting each female, KITTEL began communicating with them via text message. Soon after meeting, KITTEL requested and encouraged the victims to take sexually explicit pictures of themselves send them to him via text message. In his requests, KITTEL described in detail how he wanted each victim to pose and what he wanted her to do in the photos. After the victims complied and sent him sexually explicit images, KITTEL then sent the images from his cellular telephone to his personal e-mail account.
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 United States 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 www.projectsafechildhood.gov.
Houston, TX
Michael Johnathan Radcliff, 45, has been handed a total sentence of 121 months for distribution and possession of child pornography, United States Attorney Kenneth Magidson announced today. Radcliff pleaded guilty to the charges November 4, 2011.
Today, U.S. District Judge Melinda Harmon sentenced Radcliff and further ordered he serve 10 years on supervised release following completion of that prison term. Judge Harmon further ordered he pay $3,500 in restitution to a known victim. Radcliff is also required to register as a sex offender.
The investigation began when agents with the FBI in Dallas were conducting an undercover investigation into persons making child pornography available online. At that time, agents came across an individual in Houston sharing child pornography using peer-to-peer file-sharing software. The matter was then transferred to Houston and the FBI Innocent Images Task Force continued the investigation.
On April 29, 2011, agents executed a federal search warrant at Radcliff’s residence in Houston, at which time Radcliff admitted to searching for and downloading child pornography on the Internet. During the search, a PowerSpec desktop computer, a Toshiba laptop and a thumb drive were seized and a subsequent forensic exam resulted in the discovery of images of child pornography. At least 949 images and 92 videos of child pornography were found, some of which depicted prepubescent girls engaging in sexual intercourse and oral sex with adult males.
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