5 Missouri residents sentenced for child exploitation enterprise following joint HSI investigation

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — Four Springfield residents and a Branson woman were sentenced in federal court May 24 for engaging in a child exploitation enterprise that victimized at least three children, following a joint Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) probe.

Kevin Grant McMillan, 36, of Springfield, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Stephen R. Bough to life in federal prison without parole.

Angela Marie Brown, 39, Christine Marie Rossiter, 36, and Amber Marie Baley, 38, of Springfield, and Casie Dee Rice, 52, of Branson, were sentenced separately — on the same day — to federal prison without parole . Brown was sentenced to 12 years; Rossiter was sentenced to 10 years; Baley was sentenced to eight years; Rice was sentenced to four years.

Baley and Rossiter were also sentenced to spend the rest of their lives on supervised release following incarceration. Each defendant will be required to register as a sex offender upon release from prison and will be subject to federal and state sex offender registration requirements, which may apply throughout their life.

Each of the five defendants pleaded guilty to engaging in a child exploitation enterprise from Jan. 1, 2017, to Nov. 6, 2019. They admitted to engaging in a series of felony violations, including the sexual exploitation of minors and receiving and distributing child sexual abuse material. Those felony violations, constituting three or more separate incidents and involving more than one minor victim, comprise a child exploitation enterprise.

The federal investigation began in May 2019 when the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children notified law enforcement that McMillan had uploaded three files of child pornography through his Gmail account. The Springfield Police Department was also investigating McMillan in a separate case involving an 8-year-old victim, identified in court documents as Jane Doe 2. Springfield investigators identified additional Google accounts that contained child pornography.

On Nov. 6, 2019, law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at McMillan’s residence, where they contacted a second, 15-year-old victim, identified in court documents as Jane Doe 1, and a 17-year-old minor. Officers seized five laptops, two hard drives, an Apple iPad, a cell phone, and seven USB and micro SD cards. A forensic analyst found images of child sexual abuse material depicting Jane Doe 1, Jane Doe 2, and a third victim — a toddler identified in court documents as Jane Doe 3. There were 27,542 pornographic images and videos of subjects whose age is difficult to determine, child erotica, 682 images and videos of bestiality pornography, and 111 videos and images of child exploitive animated pornography on the devices.

Both Brown and Rossiter were living with McMillan at his Springfield residence in the spring of 2019, while the three of them were in a relationship together. McMillan was not interested in a traditional relationship, but planned on dominating several girlfriends, who would be in a submissive role. He also wanted to live the “nudist lifestyle.”

Investigators found MMS messages between McMillan and Brown. McMillan told Brown he wanted to drug and sexually assault Jane Doe 1 (who was 13 years old at the time). Brown said she would be interested in assisting him in drugging and raping children and adult women. McMillan also sent Brown sexually explicit images of Jane Doe 1, Jane Doe 2 and Jane Doe 3. They exchanged incest-related pornography, bondage pornography, bestiality pornography, child pornography and child erotica. They also had conversations about having sexual contact with children and about having children together and impregnating them. Investigators found Facebook conversations in which McMillan and Brown extensively discussed engaging in sexual contact with other individuals, including children.

Investigators found SMS and MMS messaging between McMillan and Rossiter. McMillan and Rossiter exchanged bestiality pornography, incest-related pornography and bondage pornography. In a Facebook conversation between March 2019 and May 2019, they extensively discussed engaging in sexual contact with other individuals, including children. In April 2019, they discussed McMillan wanting to have sexual contact with a 13-year-old minor male, identified in court documents as John Doe. Rossiter admitted that she received nude images of Jane Doe 2 and Jane Doe 3 from McMillan, and McMillan described sexual activity he wanted to engage in with Jane Doe 2 and Jane Doe 3.

Baley, who dated McMillan on and off again between 2012 and 2019, admitted to sending him nude images of Jane Doe 2. MMS conversations between Baley and McMillan repeatedly discussed getting Jane Doe 2 to engage in sexually explicit conduct.

Rice, who lived with McMillan for a short time in 2019, admitted that he sent child sexual abuse material to her via Google and that she received and sent child sexual abuse material to others through Facebook. In one email, Rice talked about their interest in children and described a sexual encounter where Rice would hold a female minor down while McMillan had sex with her.

The case was investigated by HSI, the Southwest Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force, and the Springfield Police Department and prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Ami Harshad Miller.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States Attorneys' Offices and the Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit https://www.justice.gov/psc. For more information about internet safety education, please visit https://www.justice.gov/psc/publications-resources.

HSI is the principal investigative arm of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), responsible for investigating transnational crime and threats, specifically those criminal organizations that exploit the global infrastructure through which international trade, travel, and finance move. HSI’s workforce of more than 8,700 employees consists of more than 6,000 special agents assigned to 237 cities throughout the United States, and 93 overseas locations in 56 countries. HSI’s international presence represents DHS’s largest investigative law enforcement presence abroad and one of the largest international footprints in U.S. law enforcement.

Learn more about HSI’s mission to eradicate child exploitation in your community on Twitter @HSIKansasCity.