Crimes against Children 7-26-12

Paducah, KY
A former Fort Campbell, Kentucky soldier has pled guilty to charges of knowingly possessing, mailing, transporting, and shipping child pornography while residing within the Fort Campbell Military Reservation and during active duty in Iraq, announced David J. Hale, United States Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky.

Timothy Lee Hansen, age 25, appeared in United States District Court in Paducah, Kentucky, yesterday and entered a guilty plea to a four-count federal indictment brought by a federal grand jury on August 17, 2011. Prior to his indictment, Hansen had been charged in a criminal complaint on July 19, 2011. During an earlier hearing, Chief United States District Judge Thomas B. Russell ordered Hansen detained without bond.

According to court records, between February 2010 and February 15, 2011, Hansen, also known as “Hydes420,” allegedly used a peer-to-peer Internet file sharing software to download, store, and trade digital images of child pornography. A subpoena issued by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) tracked the IP address of the computer used to distribute child pornography to a computer belonging to Hansen and located in a soldier’s barracks at Fort Campbell. The information was turned over to the United States Army-Criminal Investigation Division (CID) at Fort Campbell on February 14, 2011.

Hansen was identified as an active-duty soldier assigned to the 5th Special Forces Group. According to the complaint, Hansen allegedly told investigators that he possessed approximately 100 megabytes of child pornography on his personal computers at Fort Campbell. He further allegedly admitted that he obtained and used the child pornography for sexual gratification.

Salt Lake City, UT
Jeffrey David Pirente, age 44, of Saratoga Springs, will serve 168 months in federal prison after pleading guilty to distribution of child pornography. Pirente had more than 600 images of child pornography on his computer and admitted using an advanced peer-to-peer network to send the images to others.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Carol Dain wrote in the sentencing memorandum that “Pirente admitted to distributing child pornography, and, in many chats, he attempted to gain access to other individuals’ folders by obtaining passwords. He organized his files, which included sadistic images of prepubescent children. He has sought out and traded sadistic, disturbing, and vile images of the rape and torture of children, using an advanced peer-to-peer network. He should be held accountable for all of his criminal conduct.” Dain said Pirente used the advance file sharing program to share his collection with as many as 153 other individuals and exchanged chats with those individuals for months.

Charlotte, NC
A Charlotte man previously convicted by a jury for aiding and abetting the transportation of child pornography was sentenced on Wednesday, July 25, 2012, in U.S. District Court in Charlotte to serve 15 years in prison, to be followed by a lifetime of supervised release, announced Anne M. Tompkins, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina.

In May 2011, a federal jury found Rashod Sentelle Robinson, 28, of Charlotte, guilty of aiding and abetting the transportation of visual depictions of minors engaging in sexually explicit conduct. Robinson was indicted in October 2010. Testimony during the three-day trial established that in 2009 and 2010, agents with the FBI in Cleveland, Ohio, were conducting an online undercover investigation targeting people who used the Internet to share child pornography. An FBI agent testified at trial that, as part of the undercover investigation, he encountered a person using the name “rr75727” on the Internet and discovered that rr75727 was making child pornography available to others who wanted to download it from him. The FBI agent in Cleveland downloaded two videos and 18 images of child pornography directly from rr75727’s computer.

During the course of the trial, FBI agents from the Cleveland, Philadelphia, and Charlotte Offices testified that the investigation into the identity of rr75727 led to a home in Charlotte, and Charlotte FBI executed a search warrant at the home in May 2010. According to trial records, FBI agents determined that although Robinson was not at the home at the time of the search, he lived at the home when he was on breaks from attending college at Virginia Military Institute. On the day of the search, FBI agents seized several computers, including two that belonged to Robinson. Further investigation revealed that Robinson attempted to destroy evidence contained on one of the computers after he found out the FBI was investigating him.

Topeka, KS
A McPherson County man has been charged with using a 9-year-old girl to produce child pornography, U.S. Attorney Barry Grissom said today.

Philip Andra Grigsby, 50, Marquette, Kansas, is charged with two counts of enticing a minor to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing child pornography, one count of possessing child pornography, and one count of unlawful possession of a firearm after a felony conviction. The crimes are alleged to have occurred in April and July 2012 in McPherson County, Kansas.

If convicted, Grigsby faces a penalty of not less than 15 years and not more than 30 years in federal prison and a fine up to $250,000 on each of the counts of producing child pornography; not less than five years and a fine up to $250,000 on the possession count; and a maximum penalty of 10 years and a fine up to $250,000 on the gun charge. The FBI, the Australian Federal Police, the Marquette Police Department, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives investigated. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jason Hart is prosecuting.